Trivia

The "Red Scare" hurt her career. Her great passion for free speech was tested when, in the early 1950s, she told the House Un-American Activities Committee to "stuff it".

Played often ethnic-toned support roles in post-war Hollywood, primarily in small, unbilled parts. One of her better, more visible roles came in Warner Bros. The Unfaithful (1947) as a woman who is out for justice.

Some of her own poetry has appeared in local anthologies. She also was an artist and sold paintings.

Involved with the Laguna Poets since its 1959 formation, she became the group's unpaid director in 1976, and was the main force behind the Poets' expansion into an organization that has met weekly at the Laguna Beach Library and holds three larger poetry festivals each year. She retired in 1990.

Retired from the poet's society in 1990 and went into seclusion, she later died on 25 March 2002 of natural causes at age 92.

She devoted herself in later years to reading poetry and founded the Laguna Poets, California's longest running weekly poetry series, which brought major poets such as Allen Ginsberg, Charles Bukowski, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, etc. to read in Orange County.

Born in Yugoslavia, Marta lived in London during World War II and the Blitz and appeared on stage. She relocated to America in 1941, wherein the 32-year-old resumed her career on stage and eventually moved to films.

Married once to a much older man, she had a daughter, Sonia, an artist, who preceded her in death. Sonia's son and Marta's grandson, Paul Harrington, lived with his grandmother in Laguna Beach after Sonia's death.

Moved to Laguna Beach, California in the late 1950s.