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I send two dozen deep red roses festooned with gold ribbon to Marlene Dietrich welcoming her to the Adelaide Festival of Arts in 1968. I got a note of thanks from her and a phone call followed from her Manager inviting me for a drink. Kenn Brodziak gave me tickets to the show. While we were in the bar a very hip style person approached and pleaded with Kenn to take his boy on his books. ‘ One hit song in Adelaide doesn’t make him star material. Please go away’, was the reply as security guards removed him. The hit song was “Sadie the Cleaning Ladyâ€� and, of course, the boy was John Farnham and the hippy was his original manager Darrell Sambell. Born in Berlin in 1901 Marlene Dietrich was to become one of the superstars of early Hollywood. The movie that put her name on the lips of millions was “Blue Angel” in 1930. She sang the song that would become her own – and apparently could not abide – “Falling in love Again”. Following that success she was put into competition with Greta Garbo (from a different studio) and had many successes in films directed by Billy Wilder, Alfred Hitchcock and Orson Welles. Her greatest fame came from entertaining front line troops throughout WW2 with anti Nazi songs and spoofs. A complete generation recognised her “Lily Marlene” and very few artistes have even tried to cover it. Following a broken hip sustained whilst performing in Sydney, she retired to Paris where she died in 1992 aged 90.