Quotes

[on how she was cast in Two Years Before the Mast (1946)] He telephoned me, and we made a date and he told me all about the story. I said, please, I wanted to see the script. I said I had worked at Paramount before. He sent for the script and I read it and there was a part for me, all right.

[on her arrival in Hollywood] I came here by plane, Paramount paying the fare, and the day before the picture started, I signed.

[in 1944] And I must say, that it was very nice of Paramount to do all this for me. At the end of the year I could talk English as well as I do now.

[on Buddy G. DeSylva, executive producer of Two Years Before the Mast (1946)] He wanted to sign me to a term contract, but I already had been under a term contract and that was a horrible feeling. I did not like it. He said then would I sign for one picture this year and another next? I said I would if the terms were right. I think he is paying me more than he thought he would have to. Of course, that was not all. There was the matter of the billing. I did not much care what the billing was in the United States, but I specified that wherever the picture was shown south of the border, Esther Fernández would be billed as the star. That is in the contract.

Only once did I play a villain, in Flor de sangre (1951), in which, by the way, I supposedly did a nude scene with my back, running to the sea. But a double did it because I would never have dared to undress in front of everyone, since I had a very strict education.

[on Hollywood] There I studied everything, from artistic disciplines to sports and rules of society.