Steffi Duna

Steffi Duna, born Erzsébet Berindey on 8 February 1910 in Budapest, Hungary, was a dancer and actress of Czech extraction who built a career spanning European stages, Broadway, and Hollywood films. Known to friends and family by the nickname Stefi, a diminutive of Stefánia, she began dancing at the age of nine. By the time she was thirteen, she had drawn notice as a ballet dancer performing across Europe, and her early stage work included appearances in dramatized fairy tales at the Children's Theater of Budapest. Though her father was initially reluctant to support her ambitions, he ultimately enrolled her in the finest dance schools in the Hungarian capital, and she went on to perform in most of the major cities of Europe.

Her profile on the London stage grew in 1932, when she appeared in Noël Coward's revue Words and Music, joining three other actresses in introducing the song "Mad about the Boy." That same year she made her Broadway debut, and in 1933 she appeared on Broadway in Threepenny Opera. Also in 1932, Duna made her film debut in The Indiscretions of Eve in a starring role alongside Jessica Tandy, who was likewise making her screen debut.

Duna arrived in Hollywood in 1932 speaking no English. Determined to learn the language quickly, she followed the advice of directors who encouraged her to limit contact with Hungarian acquaintances in order to accelerate her progress. Within a few years she had become fluent in English as well as five additional languages. Signed by RKO Radio Pictures, she was frequently cast as Latin characters despite her Central European origins, a pattern that reflected the Hollywood conventions of the era. Her role in La Cucaracha (1934) placed her in a historically notable production, as it was the first live-action short film made in three-strip Technicolor. That same year she appeared in Man of Two Worlds, playing Guninana, the Eskimo wife of Francis Lederer, an actor with whom she had previously shared the stage in a Berlin production of Die Wunderbar. Among her other film credits, she played Nedda in the 1936 British film version of Pagliacci, starring Richard Tauber, and appeared in Anthony Adverse (1936) and Waterloo Bridge (1940). She also starred opposite Lucille Ball in Panama Lady (1939).

Duna was married twice. In 1935 she wed actor John Carroll, her co-star in Hi, Gaucho!, and the couple had one daughter before divorcing in 1938. On 18 October 1940, she married actor Dennis O'Keefe in Phoenix, Arizona, and they had a son together. Duna died on 22 April 1992 at her home in Beverly Hills of cancer, at the age of 82.