TO DEC. 30

Everything’s coming up blond in Washington this month, and it has nothing to do with Madonna. Dec. 27 is the 100th anniversary of Marlene Dietrich’s birth, and the legendary vamp is being celebrated all over town. An exhibition of Dietrich photographs continues through Dec. 10 at the Goethe-Institut, and tonight at the German Embassy, singer Karen Kohler pays tribute to Dietrich’s career as a cabaret singer (when her musical director, by the way, was a fledgling Burt Bacharach). The focus of the celebration, however, is Dietrich the screen goddess. The films to be shown this week are The Spoilers (at 7 p.m., Monday, Dec. 10, at Films on the Hill), an Alaska Gold Rush drama co-starring John Wayne; The Ship of Lost Men (at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 11, at the Library of Congress’ Pickford Theater), a silent made the year before The Blue Angel introduced Dietrich to American audiences; Shanghai Express (at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 12, Films on the Hill); and I Kiss Your Hand, Madame (pictured) and The Flame of New Orleans (both at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 13, Pickford). Upcoming are 1930’s Morocco (at 7 p.m., Friday, Dec. 14, Pickford), in which the actress’s character sacrifices everything for French Légionnaire (and real-life lover) Gary Cooper; The Scarlet Empress (at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 29, at the National Gallery of Art), with Dietrich as Catherine the Great; and Blonde Venus and The Devil Is a Woman (both at 4 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 30, at the National Gallery of Art), with the actress playing against Cary Grant and in a fantasy version of Seville, respectively. The films show until Sunday, Dec. 30, at the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop’s Films on the Hill, 545 7th St. SE; at the Library of Congress’ Pickford Theater, 101 Independence Ave. SE; and at the National Gallery of Art’s East Building Auditorium, 4th and Constitution Avenue NW. Free-$5. (202) XXX-XXXX. (Mark Jenkins)