Actors Who Have Played Adolf Hitler
I admire any actor who would play one so evil.
List activity
11K views
• 11 this weekCreate a new list
List your movie, TV & celebrity picks.
27 people
- Actor
- Writer
- Soundtrack
Alec Guinness was an English actor. He is known for his six collaborations with David Lean: Herbert Pocket in Great Expectations (1946), Fagin in Oliver Twist (1948), Col. Nicholson in The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor), Prince Faisal in Lawrence of Arabia (1962), General Yevgraf Zhivago in Doctor Zhivago (1965), and Professor Godbole in A Passage to India (1984).
Guinness is really most remembered for his portrayal of Obi-Wan Kenobi in George Lucas' original Star Wars trilogy for which he receive a nomination for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.
In 1959, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for services to the arts. In the 1970s, Guinness made regular television appearances in Britain, including the role of George Smiley in the serialisations of two novels by John le Carré: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (1979) and Smiley's People (1982). In 1980 he received the Academy Honorary Award for lifetime achievement.
Guinness was also one of three British actors, along with Laurence Olivier and John Gielgud, who made the transition from Shakespearean theatre in England to Hollywood blockbusters immediately after the Second World War.
Guinness died on 5 August 2000, from liver cancer, at Midhurst in West Sussex.Hitler: The Last Ten Days.- Actor
- Director
- Cinematographer
Bruno Ganz was an acclaimed Swiss actor who was a prominent figure in German language film and television for over fifty years. He is internationally renowned for portraying Adolf Hitler in the Academy Award-nominated film Downfall (2004).
Ganz was born in Zürich, to a Swiss mechanic father and a northern Italian mother. He decided to pursue an acting career by the time he entered university. He debuted at the theatre in 1961, and gained a reputation as a reflective, charismatic and technically brilliant stage actor. In 1970, he and Peter Stein founded the theatre company 'Schaubühne' in Berlin, Germany. On stage, Ganz portrayed Dr. Heinrich Faust in Peter Stein's staging of Faust, Part One and Faust, Part Two in 2000.
In cinema, Ganz became one of the best-known and most acclaimed actors in the German language, collaborating with many of the most respected European actors and directors of his time. He also starred in international features that reached a global audience. His film debut was The Gentleman in the Black Derby (1960). He also starred in Unknown (2011), The Counselor (2013), and The Party (2017).
Ganz died from cancer on 16 February 2019 at his home in the village of Au, in Wädenswil, Switzerland.Downfall.- Actor
- Writer
- Producer
Widely regarded as one of greatest stage and screen actors both in his native Great Britain and internationally, twice nominated for the Oscar and recipient of every major theatrical award in the UK and US, Ian Murray McKellen was born on May 25, 1939 in Burnley, Lancashire, England, to Margery Lois (Sutcliffe) and Denis Murray McKellen, a civil engineer and lay preacher. He is of Scottish, Northern Irish, and English descent. During his early childhood, his parents moved with Ian and his older sister, Jean, to the mill town of Wigan. It was in this small town that young Ian rode out World War II. He soon developed a fascination with acting and the theatre, which was encouraged by his parents. They would take him to plays, those by William Shakespeare, in particular. The amateur school productions fostered Ian's growing passion for theatre.
When Ian was of age to begin attending school, he made sure to get roles in all of the productions. At Bolton School in particular, he developed his skills early on. Indeed, his first role in a Shakespearian play was at Bolton, as Malvolio in "Twelfth Night". Ian soon began attending Stratford-upon-Avon theatre festivals, where he saw the greats perform: Laurence Olivier, Wendy Hiller, John Gielgud, Ralph Richardson and Paul Robeson. He continued his education in English Drama, but soon it fell by the wayside as he concentrated more and more on performing. He eventually obtained his Bachelor of Arts in 1961, and began his career in earnest.
McKellen began working in theatre over the next few years. Very few people knew of Ian's homosexuality; he saw no reason to go public, nor had he told his family. They did not seem interested in the subject and so he saw no reason to bring it up. In 1988, Ian publicly came out of the closet on the BBC Radio 4 program, while discussing Margaret Thatcher's "Section 28" legislation, which made the promotion of homosexuality as a family relationship by local authorities an offense. It was reason enough for McKellen to take a stand. He has been active in the gay rights movement ever since.
Ian resides in Limehouse, where he has also lived with his former long-time partner Sean Mathias. The two men have also worked together on the film Bent (1997) as well as in exquisite stage productions. To this day, McKellen works mostly in theatre, and was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1990 for his efforts in the arts. However, he has managed to make several quite successful forays into film. He has appeared in several productions of Shakespeare's works including his well received Richard III (1995), and in a variety of other movies. However, it has only been recently that his star has finally begun to shine in the eyes of North American audiences. Roles in various films, Cold Comfort Farm (1995), Apt Pupil (1998) and Gods and Monsters (1998), riveted audiences. The latter, in particular, created a sensation in Hollywood, and McKellen's role garnered him several of awards and nominations, including a Golden Globe and an Oscar nod. McKellen, as he continues to work extensively on stage, he always keeps in 'solidifying' his 'role' as Laurence Olivier's worthy 'successor' in the best sense too, such as King Lear (2008) / King Lear (2008) directed by Trevor Nunn and in a range of other staggering performances full of generously euphoric delight that have included "Peter Pan" and Noël Coward's "Present Laughter", as well as Samuel Beckett's "Waiting for Godot" and Harold Pinter's "No Man's Land" (National Theatre Live: No Man's Land (2016)), both in acclaimed productions brilliantly directed by Sean Mathias.
McKellen found mainstream success with his performance as Magneto in X-Men (2000) and its sequels. His largest mark on the big screen may be as Gandalf in "The Lord of the Rings" film trilogy directed by Peter Jackson, which he reprised in "The Hobbit" trilogy. He also reprised the role of 'King Lear' with new artistic perspectives in National Theatre Live: King Lear (2018) offering an invaluable mesmerizing experience as a natural force of stage - and screen - of infinite generosity through his unsurpassable interpretation of the titanically vulnerable king.Countdown to War.- Actor
- Composer
- Producer
Anthony Hopkins was born on December 31, 1937, in Margam, Wales, to Muriel Anne (Yeats) and Richard Arthur Hopkins, a baker. His parents were both of half Welsh and half English descent. Influenced by Richard Burton, he decided to study at College of Music and Drama and graduated in 1957. In 1965, he moved to London and joined the National Theatre, invited by Laurence Olivier, who could see the talent in Hopkins. In 1967, he made his first film for television, A Flea in Her Ear (1967).
From this moment on, he enjoyed a successful career in cinema and television. In 1968, he worked on The Lion in Winter (1968) with Timothy Dalton. Many successes came later, and Hopkins' remarkable acting style reached the four corners of the world. In 1977, he appeared in two major films: A Bridge Too Far (1977) with James Caan, Gene Hackman, Sean Connery, Michael Caine, Elliott Gould and Laurence Olivier, and Maximilian Schell. In 1980, he worked on The Elephant Man (1980). Two good television literature adaptations followed: Othello (1981) and The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1982). In 1987 he was awarded with the Commander of the order of the British Empire. This year was also important in his cinematic life, with 84 Charing Cross Road (1987), acclaimed by specialists. In 1993, he was knighted.
In the 1990s, Hopkins acted in movies like Desperate Hours (1990) and Howards End (1992), The Remains of the Day (1993) (nominee for the Oscar), Legends of the Fall (1994), Nixon (1995) (nominee for the Oscar), Surviving Picasso (1996), Amistad (1997) (nominee for the Oscar), The Mask of Zorro (1998), Meet Joe Black (1998) and Instinct (1999). His most remarkable film, however, was The Silence of the Lambs (1991), for which he won the Oscar for Best Actor. He also got a B.A.F.T.A. for this role.The Bunker.- Actor
- Director
- Soundtrack
Robert Carlyle was born in Maryhill, Glasgow, Scotland, to Elizabeth, a bus company employee, and Joseph Carlyle, a painter and decorator. He was raised by his father after his mother left him when he was four. At the age of 21, after reading Arthur Miller's "The Crucible," he enrolled in acting classes at the Glasgow Arts Centre. In 1991, together with four other actors, he founded the Raindog theatre company (named after Tom Waits' album "Rain Dog," one of Carlyle's favorites), a company dedicated to innovative work. Danny Boyle's film Trainspotting (1996) marked his breakthrough.Hitler: The Rise of Evil (Mini-Series).- Actor
- Script and Continuity Department
- Soundtrack
Noah George Taylor, the elder of two boys, was born in 1969 in London, England, to Maggie (Miller), a journalist and book editor, and Paul Taylor, a copywriter and journalist. His family lived in both England and New Zealand before returning to his parents' native Australia in 1974. His parents divorced when he was a teenager and his father remarried--to theatre publicist, Suzie Howie. Noah left home at age 16 before graduating from University High School in Melbourne when he fell into acting. He decided to pursue his craft at St. Martin's Youth Theater. Despite his intense studies, the remote, slim-framed actor did not make his professional theater debut until March 1997 with Chekhov's "The Seagull."
His work at St. Martin's led to an auspicious debut playing the painfully shy and sensitive teen Danny Embling in the coming-of-age film The Year My Voice Broke (1987). This affecting performance lost none of its heart-tugging appeal when the sequel Flirting (1991) came out four years later. Noah won awards for both films. Unconventionally typecast as the gawky, gloomy-eyed, somewhat manic depressive, directors started lining up to use the young actor. It all culminated in what is arguably the best known performance of his career--as the young, tortured genius, pianist David Helfgott, in Shine (1996). Working in tandem with Oscar-winner Geoffrey Rush, who played Helfgott as an older adult, Noah's scenes with Armin Mueller-Stahl, who played the pianist's egregiously abusive father, were incredibly powerful and helped him to win the Film Critics Circle of Australia and Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival awards. The variety of Noah's performances have been stunning over the years. He played a young Adolf Hitler in the drama Max (2002), a "what-if" spin on Hitler growing up as an angry tortured artist instead of a Fascist dictator following World War I. He played the darkly humorous protagonist in He Died with a Felafel in His Hand (2001) and the titular Jewish outcast in Simon Magus (1999).
Music, songwriting and art have been other strong passions for Noah. In 1994 he became part of a band called "The Honky Tonk Angels. A singer-guitarist, included in this band were Noah's co-stars from previous movies Loene Carmen and Kym Wilson. He has also formed other bands with such names as Cardboard Box Man, Flipper & Humphrey and The Thirteens, a country-western rock group.
American audiences have taken an equal "shine" to Noah recently, particularly as the manager of Stillwater in the popular film Almost Famous (2000); as Bryce in the popular adventure film Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001) and its sequel which both starring Angelina Jolie; a featured role in Vanilla Sky (2001) which starred Tom Cruise; and in the "Willy Wonka" extravaganza Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005) as Mr. Bucket.Max.- Bobby Watson's acting career began in the late 19th Century, in Springfield, Illinois. At age 10 he had the peanut concession on Saturday afternoons at Springfield's only dance hall, the Olympic Theatre. By age 12 he graduated to the evening concession, and joyously studied the travelling variety acts that came through the town. When he was 15, the theatre manager offered him a chance to show what he had learned from watching all the acts. His first performance consisted of two comedic impressions, the first was a blackface act and the second was a drunken Irishman. Bobby was immediately put on the Olympic payroll. A travelling medicine show, called "Kickapoo Remedies Show" (a name W.C. Fields might have used with good effect), came through Springfield and the owner of the Kickapoo medicine show took Watson out of Springfield to perform with him all over the mid west. Apparently unafraid of criticism, Watson performed the female role "Rosalind" by William Shakespeare, and the comedy mold was cast. From then on, Watson was often, but not exclusively, cast as an effeminate or unathletic character. While in Chicago, he was offered a job with Gus Edwards' shows in New York's Martinique Hotel and Coney Island, Brooklyn. While entertaining the crowds at Coney Island, the Broadway producers Cohan and Harris hired him to replace Frank Craven in the 1918 musical "Going Up." From that point on, he was destined to remain as one of the worthwhile "finds" of the theatre, and subsequently, films. A big break came in 1919 in the form of an original musical "Irene" (songs by Joseph McCarthy & Harry Tierney) with Edith Day. Watson became one of the most beloved characters in the show, portraying a popular male modiste (dressmaker) nicknamed "Madame Lucy." The show was a huge success, and a few years later he appeared in a revival of it with Irene Dunne, with whom he would be reunited in the film "The Awful Truth" (1937). He appeared in another Cohan musical show, "The Rise of Rosie O'Reilly" in 1923, and shortly thereafter he was approached with film offers. Bobby Watson is one of those versatile actors every filmgoer has seen many times playing memorable character parts. Beginning in 1942, Watson was cast as Adolf Hitler in more films than any other actor. The list of titles includes "Hitler: Dead or Alive," "The Hitler Gang," "Miracle of Morgan's Creek" and "That Nazty Nuisance." Since his earliest films, he portrayed all kinds of roles; interior decorator, radio announcer, hotel manager, a dance director, a band leader, dress maker, detective, and even a diction coach (uncredited) in "Singin' in the Rain."The Devil with Hitler.
Hitler-Dead or Alive.
The Nazty Nuisance.
The Miracle of Morgan's Creek.
The Hitler Gang.
A Foreign Affair.
The Story of Mankind.
On the Double.
The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. - Michael Sheard was born on 18 June 1938 in Aberdeen, Grampian, Scotland, UK. He was an actor, known for Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980), The Outsider (1983) and Mind Your Language (1977). He was married to Rosalind Allaway. He died on 31 August 2005 in Newport, Isle of Wight, England, UK.Rogue Male.
The Tomorrow People - Hitler's Last Secret: Men Like Rats, Hitler's Last Secret: Seeds of Destruction.
The Dirty Dozen: Next Mission.
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. - Günter Meisner was born on 18 April 1926 in Bremen, Germany. He was an actor and director, known for Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971), The Boys from Brazil (1978) and In a Glass Cage (1986). He was married to Gisela Albrecht Meisner. He died on 5 December 1994 in Berlin, Germany.Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years.
Ace of Aces.
The Winds of War (Mini-Series). - Actor
- Producer
'Billy' Frick began working as a cabinet maker but later became an acrobat. From the late 1940s he was also manager and companion of Swiss burlesque dancer and actress Syra Marty (1921 - 2011), who toured the U.S. as a Marylin Monroe lookalike. Although being bald-headed in real life and having no resemblance with the original, Billy Frick started a fourth career in his life by impersonating Adolf Hitler with makeup and wig in several movies and TV-episodes.
On his frequent visits to Europe he caused at least twice headlines in the German papers. In 1971 he attended a Munich night club show (starring Syra Marty) in full Hitler regalia. The auditorium took it as it was intended, namely as a stage act respectively a joke and applauded.
Due to a rising number of WW2 and Hitler books in Germany, Frick was hired in 1973 by the infamous political satire magazine PARDON to rise havoc as Hitler at a fair in Frankfurt. He was attacked by several visitors and finally arrested by the police overnight. After his release, Frick told the press, that he was unsatisfied that his appearance as 'the Führer' did not cause for more uproar in the public.
After Frick's death in 1977, Syra Marty left show business and retired in Florida.Is Paris Burning?
Appointment With Destiny - The Plot to Murder Hitler.
How to Seduce a Woman.
Nazis dans le metro.- Actor
- Soundtrack
Carl Ekberg was born on 1 March 1903 in Skien, Norway. He was an actor, known for Loving Couples (1964) and Djurgårdsnätter (1933). He died on 25 April 1976 in Los Angeles, California, USA.Citizen Kane.
Man Hunt.
The Wife Takes a Flyer.
Once Upon a Honeymoon.
What Did You Do in the War, Daddy?- Actor
- Soundtrack
Ludwig Haas was born on 16 April 1933 in Eutin, Lübeck, Oldenburg [now Schleswig-Holstein], Germany. He was an actor, known for Lindenstraße (1985), Shining Through (1992) and Erfolg (1991). He was married to Marianne Simon. He died on 4 September 2021 in Neumünster, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany.The Great Escape II: The Untold Story.
Shining Through.
Petain.- Actor
- Soundtrack
The actor and Broadway director Luther Adler was born into a Yiddish theatrical dynasty. One of the six children born to Jacob P. and Sara Adler, he made his debut in the world in New York City, originally billed as Lutha J. Adler. His full siblings Charles, Jay, Julia, and Stella (the famous acting teacher) as well as his half-siblings Celia and Abram Adler all appeared on Broadway, and his father Jacob, the biggest star of the Yiddish-language theater, was considered one of the great American actors.
The Yiddish theater was an important cultural venue in the days when the millions of Jewish immigrants in the greater metropolitan New York area spoke Yiddish as their first (and sometimes only) language. People who trained and appeared in the Yiddish theater were instrumental in the development of the modern American theater and film, and some, including Sidney Lumet, are still active in the 21st century. It was in this cultural milieu that Luther and his siblings got their grounding in acting and the theater.
Jacob Adler owned and operated his own stage in New York's Lower East Side, and Luther began appearing in the family productions at the age of five with the Adler production of "Schmendrick." He made his official debut as an actor at the age of 13 at his father's theater and his Broadway debut at the the age of 18. Billed as Lutha Adler, he appeared in the Provincetown Players' production of Theodore Drieser's "The Hand of the Potter" in December 1921 at the Provincetown Playhouse,
Adler's first Broadway hit was "Humoresque" in 1923, and he appeared regularly in top productions throughout the '20s, including "Street Scene" (1929) and "Red Dust" (1929). Along with his sister 'Stella Adler", Luther Adler was one of the original members of the Group Theatre acting company, which was formed in 1931 by Harold Clurman (his future brother-in-law), Cheryl Crawford, and Lee Strasberg. Others who would make their bones in the company were Elia Kazan, Julius "John" Garfield, Howard Da Silva, Franchot Tone, John Randolph, Will Geer, Clifford Odets and Lee J. Cobb.
The Group Theatre was dedicated to bringing realism to the American stage and was instrumental in introducing the Stanislavsky technique into American acting. Most members were leftists if not communists, and the collective wanted to produce plays dealing with social issues. For the Groupe Theatre, Adler appeared in "Night Over Taos" (1932), "Success Story" (1933), "Alien Corn" (1933) and two seminal works of the American stage written by Odets: "Awake and Sing!" (1935) and "Golden Boy" (1937). He played opposite leading ladies Katharine Cornell in "Alien Corn" (1933), his sister Stella in "Gold Eagle Guy "(1934), "Awake and Sing!" and "Paradise Lost" (both 1935), and Frances Farmer in "Golden Boy" (1937).
His appearance as the urban ethnic boxer Joe Bonaparte in Odets' "Golden Boy" arguably was his greatest role, but when the film was made in 1939, he was passed over for the improbably cast Wlliam Holden, a white-bread WASP. Although Adler appeared in many motion pictures, his reputation would remain primarily that of a stage actor.
Adler became a director on Broadway in 1942, though his first staging, "They Should Have Stayed in Bed", was a flop, lasting but 11 performances. He next directed Ben Hecht's pro-Israel propaganda play "A Flag is Born" in 1946, starring the great Paul Muni, a graduate of the Yiddish theater, and newcomer Marlon Brando, an Irish-American born-Protestant who had been trained by his sister Stella. The play, which raised money for Jewsh refugees from the Holocaust seeking sanctuary in Palestine, was a hit, running for 120 performances. He also directed "Angel Street" (1955) and "A View from the Bridge" (1960). He last appeared on Broadway as a replacement in the long running "Fiddler on the Roof."
Adler made his movie debut in Lancer Spy (1937), but he never became a star in that medium. His best roles like "Golden Boy" and "Humoresque" were taken by other actors, including Group Theatre alumnus John Garfield. He had memorable supporting turns in the noir classic D.O.A. (1949), in Joseph Losey's remake of M (1951), in Paul Muni's last film The Last Angry Man (1959), in the Holocaust drama The Man in the Glass Booth (1975), and as Paul Newman's mobster uncle in Absence of Malice (1981). He also worked frequently on television.
From 1938 until 1947, Adler was married to the actress Sylvia Sidney. They had one child, a son, Jacob. Luther Adler died in Kutztown, Pennsylvania on December 8, 1984. He was 81 years old.The Magic Face.
The Desert Fox: The Story of Rommel.- Mikhail Astangov was a legendary stage actor of the Vakhtangov Theatre in Moscow.
He was born Mikhail Fyodorovich Ruzhnikov on November 3, 1900, in Warsaw, Russian Empire (now Warsaw, Poland). His father worked for Imperial Russian railroad. In 1920 he made his acting debut in Theatrical Studio of Feodor Chaliapin Sr.. From 1923 to 1930 he worked as actor in Leningrad, Odessa, and other cities. From 1930 - 1941 he was member of the troupe at Moscow Theatre of Revolution, then was member of Theatre of Mossovet.
From 1945 to 1965 Astangov was member of the troupe at Vakhtangov Theatre in Moscow. There his stage partners were such actors as Yuri Zavadsky, Mikhail Ulyanov, Ruben Simonov, Boris Zakhava, Vladimir Etush, Varvara Popova, Irina Kupchenko, Yuliya Borisova, Lyudmila Maksakova, Lyudmila Tselikovskaya, Marianna Vertinskaya, Nina Ruslanova, Nikolai Plotnikov, Vasiliy Lanovoy, Yuriy Yakovlev, Vyacheslav Shalevich, Andrei Abrikosov, Grigori Abrikosov, Boris Babochkin, Nikolai Gritsenko, Nikolai Timofeyev, Nikolai Bubnov, Andrey Tutyshkin, and Aleksandr Grave, among others. His most memorable stage performances were such roles as Cyrano de Bergerac (1946), and the title role in the Shakespeare's "Hamlet" (1958) directed by Boris Zakhava.
Mikhail Astangov was designated People's Actor of the USSR (1955), and was awarded the State Stalin's Prize tree times (1948, 1950, 1951) for his roles on Soviet war dramas. He died of a heart failure on April 20, 1965, in Moscow, Russia, Soviet Union, and was laid to rest in the Convent Cemetery of Donskoy Monastery in Moscow, Russia.Stalingradskaya bitva I (The Battle for Stalingrad).
The Victors and the Vanquished. - Bill Freed is known for The Madmen of Mandoras (1963), They Saved Hitler's Brain (1968) and Tonight for Sure (1962).The Madmen of Mandoras.
They Saved Hitler's Brain. - Actor
- Director
Curt Conway was born on 4 May 1913 in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. He was an actor and director, known for The Twilight Zone (1959), Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre (1963) and Play of the Week (1959). He was married to Gail Leonard, Sandra Francis, Kim Stanley and Marilynn June Frahm. He died on 10 April 1974 in Los Angeles, California, USA.The Twilight Zone: He's Alive.- Actor
- Producer
- Cinematographer
Tom Schilling was born on 10 February 1982 in Berlin, Germany. He is an actor and producer, known for A Coffee in Berlin (2012), Before the Fall (2004) and Who Am I (2014).Mein Kampf.- Actor
- Music Department
- Additional Crew
Tobias Moretti was born on 11 July 1959 in Innsbruck, Tyrol, Austria. He is an actor, known for Kommissar Rex (1994), A Hidden Life (2019) and The Hard Cops (2004). He has been married to Julia Moretti since 31 August 1997. They have three children.Speer und er (Mini-Series).- Actor
- Director
Martin Wuttke was born on 8 February 1962 in Gelsenkirchen, Germany. He is an actor and director, known for Inglourious Basterds (2009), Hanna (2011) and Cloud Atlas (2012).Inglorious Basterds.- Actor
- Soundtrack
David Bamber was born on 19 September 1954 in Manchester, Lancashire, England, UK. He is an actor, known for Valkyrie (2008), Miss Potter (2006) and The Bourne Identity (2002). He has been married to Julia Swift since July 1982. They have two children.Valkyrie.- Actor
- Additional Crew
Udo Schenk was born on 11 April 1953 in Wittenberge, German Democratic Republic. He is an actor, known for In aller Freundschaft (1998), The King's Choice (2016) and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose: The Forgotten Hero (2005). He is married to Marina Krogull. They have one child. He was previously married to Cornelia Lippert.The Round Up.- Actor
- Director
- Additional Crew
Despite many a powerful performance, this actor's actor never quite achieved the stardom he deserved. Ultimately, Richard Basehart became best-known to television audiences as Admiral Harriman Nelson, commander of the glass-nosed nuclear submarine 'S.S.R.N Seaview' in Irwin Allen's Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1964), shown on ABC from 1964 to 1968. Basehart's distinctively deep, resonant voice also provided narrations in feature films, TV mini-series and for documentaries.
Born in Zanesville, Ohio, on August 14 1914, Basehart was one of four siblings born to a struggling and soon-to-be widowed editor of a local newspaper. Upon leaving college, he worked briefly as a radio announcer and then attempted to follow in his father's journalistic footsteps as a reporter. Controversy over one of his stories led to his departure from the paper and cleared the path to pursue acting as a career. In 1932, Basehart made his theatrical bow with the Wright Players Stock Company in his home town and subsequently spent five years playing varied and interesting roles at the Hedgerow Theatre in Philadelphia. From 1938, he began to work in New York on and off-Broadway. Seven years later he received the New York Drama Critics Circle Best Newcomer Award for "The Hasty Heart", a drama by John Patrick, in which Basehart played a dying Scottish soldier. In 1945, he received his first film offers. When he heard director Bretaigne Windust was seeking an authentic Scot for the lead role in The Hasty Heart, Basehart not only effected an authentic enough burr to win the part, but won also the 1945 New York Critic's Award as the most promising actor of the year. His accent was so good that a visiting leader of a Scottish clan told the actor he knew his clan.
Basehart made his debut on the big screen with Repeat Performance (1947) at Eagle-Lion, a minor film noir with Joan Leslie, followed at Warner Brothers with the Gothic Barbara Stanwyck thriller Cry Wolf (1947). His third picture finally got him critical plaudits for playing a sociopathic killer, relentlessly hunted through drainage tunnels in He Walked by Night (1948), a procedural police drama shot in a semi-documentary style. Variety gave a positive review, commenting "With this role, Basehart establishes himself as one of Hollywood's most talented finds in recent years. He heavily overshadows the rest of the cast..."
It was the first of many charismatic performances in which Basehart would excel at tormented or introverted characters, portraying angst, foreboding or mental anguish. His gallery of characters came to include the notorious Robespierre, chief architect of the Reign of Terror (1949), set during the French Revolution. He was one of the feuding Hatfields in Roseanna McCoy (1949) and in Fourteen Hours (1951) (based on a real 1938 Manhattan suicide) had a tour de force turn as a man perched on the high ledge of an office building threatening to jump. For much of the film's duration, the camera was firmly focused on the actor's face. Basehart later recalled "It was an actor's dream, in which I hogged the camera lens, and the role called on me to act mostly with my eyes, lips and face muscles". The New York Times reviewer Bosley Crowther called his performance 'startling and poignant'.
Eschewing conventional movie stardom, Basehart meticulously selected and varied his roles, avoiding, as he put it, "stereotyping at the expense of not amassing an impressive bank account.'' In the wake of the sudden death of his first wife, Basehart left the U.S. for Italy. In March 1951, he got married a second time (to the actress Valentina Cortese) and appeared in a succession of European movies, playing the ill-fated clown Il Matto in Federico Fellini's classic The Road (1954); against type, essayed a swashbuckling nobleman reclaiming his titles and estate in Cartouche (1955), and (again for Fellini), played a member of a gang of grifters in The Swindle (1955). He was also ideally cast as the mild-mannered Ishmael in John Huston's excellent version of Moby Dick (1956) and as Ivan, one of The Brothers Karamazov (1958).
By 1960, Basehart's second marriage had ended in divorce and the actor returned to America where he found movie opportunities few and far between. The small screen to some extent reinvigorated his career with numerous series guest appearances and his lengthy stint in the popular Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. He also received critical praise for his role as Henry Wirtz, commandant of the Confederacy's most infamous prison camp, in the Emmy and Peabody Award-winning television drama The Andersonville Trial (1970).
Not only an active human rights campaigner, Basehart was also strongly opposed to the experimental use of animals. With his third wife Diana Lotery he set up the animal welfare charity, Actors and Others for Animals, in 1971. He died after suffering a series of strokes in Los Angeles on September 17 1984 at the age of 70.Hitler.- Actor
- Composer
- Writer
Helge Schneider was born on 30 August 1955 in Mülheim an der Ruhr, Germany. He is an actor and composer, known for 00 Schneider - Jagd auf Nihil Baxter (1994), 00 Schneider - Im Wendekreis der Eidechse (2013) and Texas - Doc Snyder hält die Welt in Atem (1993).Mein Fuhrer: The Truly Truest Truth About Adolf Hitler.- Rudolph Fleischer was born on 27 October 1928 in Prague, Czechoslovakia [now Czech Republic]. He is an actor, known for Fatherland (1994), Okurkový hrdina (1963) and Na koho to slovo padne (1985).Fatherland.
- Actor
- Writer
- Director
Highly acclaimed English actor, playwright, author and director continues to set the benchmark in stunning, intense performances on both stage and screen. Berkoff was born in Stepney, London in August 1937 and received dramatic arts training in both Paris and London and then moved on to performing with several repertory companies, before he formed the London Theatre Group in 1968. Berkoff had actually been appearing in uncredited roles in UK cinema since 1959, and started to get noticed by casting agents with his performances in Hamlet at Elsinore (1964), Nicholas and Alexandra (1971), A Clockwork Orange (1971) and Barry Lyndon (1975).
Mainstream film fans are probably most familiar with Steven Berkoff via his portrayal of a trio of ice cold villains in several big budget Hollywood productions of the 1980s. Firstly, he played a rogue general plotting to launch a war in Europe in Octopussy (1983), then a drug smuggling art dealer out to kill Detroit narcotics officer Eddie Murphy in Beverly Hills Cop (1984), and thirdly as a sadistic Russian commando officer torturing Sylvester Stallone in Rambo: First Blood Part II (1985).
Berkoff continued to contribute scintillating performances and was quite memorable as Adolf Hitler in War and Remembrance (1988), The Krays (1990) and the haunting The Tell-Tale Heart (1991). Further villainous roles followed for the steely Berkoff in Fair Game (1995) and the Jean-Claude Van Damme kick flick Legionnaire (1998). He excelled in the camp comedy 9 Dead Gay Guys (2002), played UK crime figure Charlie Richardson Snr. in Charlie (2004) and then appeared in the passionate Greek film about mail order brides simply titled, Brides (2004) ("Brides").
His screen performances are but one part of the brilliance of Steven Berkoff, as he has additionally built a formidable reputation for his superb craftsmanship in the theatre. Berkoff has written and performed original plays including "Decadence", "Harry's Christmas Lunch" "Brighton Beach Scumbags" and "Sink the Belgrano", as well as appearing in productions of "Hamlet", "Macbeth" and "Coriolanus" to rapturous audiences right across the globe. Furthermore, he has authored several highly entertaining books on the theatre and his life including "The Theatre of Steven Berkoff", "Coriolanus in Deutscheland", "A Prisoner in Rio", "I am Hamlet" and "Meditations on Metamorphosis".War and Remembrance.- Actor
- Writer
Ryszard Pietruski was born on 7 October 1922 in Wyszecino, Pomorskie, Poland. He was an actor and writer, known for Europa Europa (1990), Wilczy bilet (1964) and Psy (1992). He died on 14 September 1996 in Warsaw, Mazowieckie, Poland.Europa Europa.- Actor
- Writer
- Producer
Oliver Masucci, born 1968, is an award-winning German actor. He grew up in Bonn, where his father - an Italian immigrant - owned and ran several Italian restaurants. Oliver learned cooking at the age of four and regularly turns his hotel rooms into Italian-style kitchens because cooking makes him feel like home when shooting abroad for ten months per year. He has tried to teach his three children how to cook - unsuccessfully so far. He lives in Switzerland and Mallorca. At the age of 12, while still in school, Oliver was cast for theatre plays at Stadttheater Bonn. After leaving high school in 1989 he was accepted into the Berlin University of Arts' acting school. After his studies he quickly turned into a much sought-after actor on all major theatre stages in Germany, Switzerland and Austria (among them: Basel, Berlin, Bochum, Hamburg, München, Salzburger Festspiele, Zürich). Oliver Masucci has performed thousands of times on stage, for more than 20 years, and eventually was appointed ensemble member of the prestigious "Burgtheater" Vienna in 2009. In 2014 he was cast to play Adolf Hitler in the Borat-style adaption of the satirical novel "Look who's back". He has since played in various award-winning German films, among them "Herrliche Zeiten" by Oscar Roehler, "When Hitler stole pink rabbit" by Oscar-winning director Caroline Link and "The Royal Game" by Philipp Stölzl - which will be released for an international audience in 2022. Oliver has been nominated for the German Film Award for four times. He received the award for best actor in a leading role in 2021. He has also received the renowned Bayerischer Filmpreis and the Grimme Award. He portrayed artist Josef Beuys in the Florian Henckel v. Donnersmarck film "Never look away", which was nominated for two Academy Awards in 2019. Later this year he took on the lead role of film director Rainer Werner Fassbinder in the film "Enfant Terrible" by Oskar Roehler, which was chosen for the official selection of the Festival de Cannes in 2020. Internationally, he is best known for the lead role of Ulrich Nielsen in the first German Netflix series "Dark". It became one of the most-viewed series worldwide and was crowned "Greatest Netflix Original Series" by Rotten Tomatoes users in 2020. Further English-speaking international roles include Michael Verhoeven in the Soderbergh series "The Girlfriend Experience" (Season 3), Moses in the Netflix-Series "Tribes of Europa", Captain Alban in "The Swarm" by Game-of-Thrones showrunner Frank Doelger (release scheduled 2022) and Klaus - Jamie Foxx' antagonist - in the upcoming Netflix vampire movie "Day Shift" (2022). This year, Oliver will further be seen as the lead in the Amazon Prime Original Series "German Crime Stories - Bound (Gefesselt)". In "Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore", which premiered in London in March 2022, Oliver stars as Anton Vogel, Head of Wizarding World. In early 2022, Roman Polanski cast him as lead actor in his film "The Palace" (2023).Er ist wieder da.