Sally Faulkner

Sally Faulkner (née von Falkenhayn) was born 14 June 1918 in Sankt Goar, Germany. Raised in Hollywood by émigré parents, young Sally dreamed of becoming a film director, graduated from the film school at USC, and landed a job as script girl for George Cukor on Gone with the Wind. In 1939, a job offer from Leni Riefenstahl brought Sally to Berlin, where she worked on films under Nazi director Veit Harlan. As World War Two began, Sally returned to the USA to work on morale films for the Army under director Frank Capra. A chance meeting with Budd Schulberg took Sally to Nuremberg to create filmed evidence for the prosecution at the war crimes trial. In August 1948, Sally was awarded the Distinguished Civilian Service Medal by the Department of Defense for her Nuremberg work, the highest honor for a civilian working for the DoD. After a long and distinguished career as a documentarian and educator, Sally died at The Motion Picture Country Home in Woodland Hills on 11 June 2019, a few days before her 101st birthday.

Dancing in the Darkness by Sally Faulkner

Sally Faulkner is a gifted, ambitious young woman who dreams of becoming a film director — impossible in male-dominated Hollywood in 1938. Then a chance meeting with German director Leni Riefenstahl (Triumph of the Will) sweeps Sally from the sets of Gone With the Wind to the bloodlands of Poland, the Łódź ghetto, Adolf Hitler’s Berghof and the black heart of the Third Reich. Sally’s ambition blinds her to the evil around her … until a forbidden romance brings a devastating awakening. She returns to America frantically seeking redemption, joins Hollywood’s elite making propaganda films to support the war effort, and returns to a defeated Germany to create the filmed evidence that convicts Nazi war criminals of Crimes Against Humanity. Then – just as Sally believes she has wiped the slate – her past threatens to destroy her.

ISBN-10 ‏: ‎ 1916732550

One publisher’s fascinating critique of a book they’d love to have published… Published May 26 2025, Dancing in the Darkness can be purchased here.