Anton Karas members of the British Royal family. Princess Margaret invited him to London's fashionable "Empress Club", where he played twice a week during his stay at London. He also appeared before Queen Juliana of the Netherlands, members of the Swedish royal family, and Pope Pius XII. By the end of 1949, half a million copies of "The Harry Lime Theme" had been sold, an unprecedented number for the time. The success of the score also caused a surge in zither sales. In Austria, the film opened on 10 March 1950, in Vienna's Apollo Kino, and it initially offended some Viennese inhabitants,
Alexander Korda to the studio system. Korda had to wait some time before gaining his first directorial assignment. His first American film was a drama titled "The Stolen Bride" (1927). Korda was chosen as it was a Hungarian-themed romance about a peasant's love for a countess. The film starred the American actress Billie Dove, rather than Korda's wife. After "The Stolen Bride"'s moderate success, Korda was brought in to work on the comedy "The Private Life of Helen of Troy" (1927), replacing the previous director, George Fitzmaurice. The film retells the story of Helen of Troy, parodying the plot-line of historical epics