Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, April 24, 1990                   TAG: 9004240052
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: E6   EDITION: STATE 
SOURCE: NIKKI FINKE LOS ANGELES TIMES
DATELINE: NEW YORK                                LENGTH: Medium

SECRET GARBO MEMOIR TO BEAT OTHERS TO THE PRESS

Simon & Schuster confirmed Friday the existence of the book by the late Polish novelist and poet Antoni Gronowicz and set a publication date for June. The reason it could be published in just a matter of weeks is that it was already written and ready for press. It will beat by more than a year two other books in the works on Garbo - a biography by Barry Paris for Alfred E. Knopf and a remembrance by a friend, Ray Daum, for Harper & Row.

Gronowicz, who died in 1985, met Garbo in Geneva in 1938 and remained a close friend with whom she talked often for more than 20 years, according to Simon & Schuster spokeswoman Victoria Meyer.

"Those at Simon & Schuster who have read the biography describe it as a moving, fascinating and candid account, which will in no way tarnish her memory or diminish the Garbo legend," Meyer said.

According to the publisher, the memoir describes in detail Garbo's childhood in Sweden, her memories of movie stardom and her love life. Among the people discussed are her discoverer, mentor and lover Mauritz Stiller, actors John Gilbert, Robert Montgomery, Robert Taylor, Charles Boyer and Melvyn Douglas as well as conductor Leopold Stokowski, millionaire George Schlee, diet guru Gayelord Hauser and photographer Cecil Beaton.

"In the book, Gronowicz also recalls Miss Garbo talking about the often rumored fact that `women pursued [her] more often and more persistently' than did men," according to a Simon & Schuster statement released Friday.

Whether Garbo actually collaborated with Gronowicz on his book is unknown, Meyer acknowledged. "One can only conjecture, but I don't think that was the case." Other publishing sources familiar with the project say Garbo cooperated with Gronowicz for several years until she decided to stop. When Simon & Schuster acquired the biography in 1976, it was "on the understanding that it would not be published during the actress' lifetime," Meyer explained. "Simon & Schuster insisted on this condition out of respect for Miss Garbo and her wishes."

Gronowicz, who included a prologue describing how he came to know Garbo, takes his narrative of her life only through the late 1950s. An afterword by film critic Richard Schickel brings the biography up to the present time.

The 476-page book will have a first printing of 125,000.