Our November 1983 Tribute to Elisabeth Bergner fell on the evening of The Day After; therefore, many who might have attended the program missed it.

An English remake of Bergner's German triumph, Der Traeumende Mund, the first film to win her international recognition, Dreaming Lips is based on a play by Henri Bernstein, the melodramatic Melo, adapted by German emigré Carl Mayer (The Last Laugh, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Sunrise). Contemporary critics were almost unanimous in their recognition of Bergner as the film's transcendent feature: “By the very spirituality of her performance she gives it body. By the very intangibilities of her characterization she motivates it.” (New York Times) The story places Bergner at the center of a love triangle, caught between a boy-husband (Romney Brent) whom she loves, and the dashing, demanding, macho musician (Raymond Massey) with whom she is in love. In her book, 5001 Nights at the Movies, critic Pauline Kael reassesses Dreaming Lips: “That extraordinary chameleon Elisabeth Bergner...had a triumph in this English production.... (S)he moves like a starved cat, talks on tiptoe, and ever so cleverly breaks your heart.... This film is one of the best examples of a genre that has all but disappeared: the bittersweet conflict of desire versus responsibility--pure romance.”