“Having worked exclusively in the theatre for three years, cine­ma unexpectedly caught up with me again. Should the boycott be terminated? Not at all. … I was “smuggled” into the film. It must have come as quite a surprise when my name appeared in the newspaper, but my comeback was a fact. During the pre­miere in Berlin, I received demonstrative applause throughout the whole film, and after the showing the audience stood up and called for me, until they were requested from the stage to leave the theatre so that the audience for the next showing could take their seats. The press, too, who during the years when I was not filming had constantly searched for me, received me as never before. The ice was finally broken. I was inundated with offers. I accepted some of them because I found them particularly interesting, but with the theatre in the back­ground, I didn’t need to enslave myself. But cinema, as it was then, did not succeed in tearing me away from theatre again”.

Asta Nielsen, Die schweigende Muse, Veb Hinstorff, Berlin, 1961

“I had in my hands a story which interested me very much. It was entitled Laster der Menschheit.” – This is the director Rudolf Meinert’s testimony as told to E.M. Mungenast who was preparing a book about Asta Nielsen, published in 1929 – “The feminine character was a cocaine addict mother ready to do anything to keep her daughter from falling into the same vice. In a word, a terrific part, made to measure for Asta Nielsen, the one and only able to interpret such a marked part. But it was a long time since the actress had appeared on the screen. The journalists talked about her definitive retirement. But I had no intention of surrending and began to phone her. When I succeeded in getting in touch with her surprisingly she told me: “All right, but first I want to read the script.” Incredible that such a sublime actress as she decided on a film, even such a minor production as this, from reading the script!

I was sitting on pins and needles for some time, after sending her the script: will she accept or not? I was obsessed: the film would be made only if Asta said yes, it was “her” film. For me, there was no-one else for the part. When she told me she accepted, I was beside myself with joy. And when we met, Asta already had clear ideas about the character. It seemed she could already see it as a whole, its lines, its colors. She herself chose the costumes. A few words were sufficient to agree with Lippert, the cameraman. An extraordinary woman, with a sensitivity that flowed from the tips of her fingers. She came into the world to make those films she made.

Laster der Menschheit was shot in almost absolute silence, in complete calm, at least as much as could be expected with her character, capable in certain moments of literally exploding. I repeat, the character was created by her, she saw it on the screen even before shooting. And if I have to say the truth, all the truth, I almost don’t remember having directed this film. She was the director. And excellent as well, I should add.”

(Vittorio Martinelli)