German postcard by Photo-Kitt, München, no. 518. Photo: Camera Film / Kurt Julius. Erich Ponto in Film ohne titel/Film Without Title (Rudolf Jugert, 1948).
Erich Ponto (1884-1957) was a German film and stage actor. He became known as J.J. Peachum in Brecht’s ‘Dreigroschenoper ‘(Three Penny Opera). From the 1930s on, he played supporting and leading parts in dozens of German films. He co-starred with Heinz Rühmann in the comedy Die Feuerzangenbowle/The Punch Bowl (1944), a classic of German cinema and a cult film among German students.
Erich Johannes Bruno Ponto was born in Lübeck in 1884. He was the youngest of four children of a textile merchant, Heinrich Ludwig Ponto and his wife Ida, née Albers. They initially lived in Lübeck and later moved to Hamburg-Eimsbüttel. Erich Ponto attended school in Altona. He studied pharmacy at the University of Munich, where he went to lectures delivered by physicist Wilhelm Röntgen. His discovery of X-rays or Röntgen rays, had earned him the inaugural Nobel Prize in Physics in 1901. Ponto worked for a few years as a pharmacist but was already passionate about acting during his university time. He started to take acting lessons and eventually became a full-time actor. Ponto made his stage debut at the Stadttheater Passau in 1908. It was followed by engagements in Nordhausen, Reichenberg (Liberec), and Düsseldorf. From 1914 to 1947 he was a member of the Hoftheater Dresden ensemble (Staatstheater Dresden from 1918). In the season 1946/47 he also worked there as an intendant In 1920, Ponto made his first film appearance in the short film Hampelmanns Glückstag/Hampelmann's Lucky Day (N.N., 1920), which was followed by Der Geiger von Meißen/The Fiddler of Meissen (Ferdinand Roberti, 1921). However, Ponto's cinema career only began with the sound film at the end of the 1920s. On stage ‘his most famous role was that of J.J. Peachum in the original production of Bertolt Brecht's 'Dreigroschenoper’ (The Threepenny Opera) in 1928. During the Third Reich, he won the title of Staatsschauspieler in 1938, the highest title that could be awarded to a stage actor in Nazi Germany. Later stage roles included Nathan the Wise in 1945 and Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman in 1950.
Erich Ponto only started to appear in films regularly after the start of the sound film, when he was already middle-aged. He had a starring role in the Paramount drama Weib im Dschungel/Woman in the Jungle (Dimitri Buchowetzki, 1931) opposite Charlotte Ander and Ernst Stahl-Nachbaur. The drama set in British Malaya was shot at the Joinville Studios in Paris as the German-language version of The Letter, based on the 1927 play The Letter by W. Somerset Maugham. Such multiple-language versions were common during the early years of sound before dubbing became widespread. He played supporting parts in the German crime drama Der Mann, der den Mord beging/The Man Who Murdered (Kurt a.k.a. Curtis Bernhardt, 1931) starring Conrad Veidt, and the melodrama Schlußakkord/Final Accord (1936) with Lil Dagover. It was the first melodrama directed by Detlef Sierck, who later as Douglas Sirk became the grand master of melodrama in Hollywood. Ponto became a well-known character actor in German cinema of the 1930s and 1940s. He often played eccentric or villainous roles. He played the title role in the historical comedy Schneider Wibbel/Wibbel the Tailor (Viktor de Kowa, 1939) co-starring Fita Benkhoff and Irene von Meyendorff. He appeared as Mayor Amschel Rothschild in the antisemitic Nazi film Die Rothschilds/The Rothschilds (Erich Waschneck, 1940). He also played a stuffy school teacher in Die Feuerzangenbowle/The Punch Bowl (Heinz Weiss, 1944) with Heinz Rühmann. Rühmann’s transformation of the accomplished writer back to a not-so-innocent schoolboy is an example of the cheerful escapism popular in German films at the end of World War II. In 1942, propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels called for the production of predominantly entertaining films in Germany to distract the population from the political and moral debacle of the war. The charm of the teachers in the film lies in their old-fashioned attitudes and individual quirks. As representatives of an older, non-fascist generation, they were a nostalgic reminder of a lost past to the wartime generation in Germany. The film ridicules and at the same time celebrates this lost individuality through parody. Since the 1980s, the film has gained cult film status at many German universities. During party-like showings in university auditoriums in early December, thousands of students bring props to participate in the film's action similar to audience participation in showings of The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
When Erich Ponto’s house was searched during the Nazi era, original drawings by Käthe Kollwitz, who was frowned upon by the regime, were confiscated. Ponto claimed that he needed them for his work and so they remained in his possession. In 1944, Ponto was included in the Reich Ministry of Propaganda's list of so-called ‘Gottbegnadeten. He appeared in the mysterious films Der Fall Molander/The Molander Case (1945) by Georg Wilhelm Pabst. In 1944, Pabst started shooting the film for Terra. As shooting was just completed at the Barrandov Studios in Prague, and the process of editing began, Prague was liberated by the Red Army and Pabst was forced to abandon the work. The remaining film is kept at the Národní Filmový Archiv in Prague. After World War II Erich Ponto had a supporting part in the drama Zwischen gestern und morgen/Between Yesterday and Tomorrow (Harald Braun, 1947) starring Hildegard Knef, Winnie Markus and Sybille Schmitz. It was part of the cycle of rubble films and examines issues of collective guilt and future rebuilding. He then appeared in a supporting role in the classic British thriller The Third Man (Carol Reed, 1949), playing a sinister physician. He played the lead in the dark drama Schicksal aus zweiter Hand/Second Hand Destiny (Wolfgang Staudte 1949) with Marianne Hoppe. Very successful was the family comedy Das fliegende Klassenzimmer/The Flying Classroom (Kurt Hoffmann, 1954) starring Paul Dahlke, Heliane Bei and Paul Klinger. It is an adaptation of Erich Kästner’s novel ‘The Flying Classroom’(1933). In 1955 Ponto won the German Film Award as the Best Male Actor in a Supporting Role for Himmel ohne Sterne/Sky Without Stars (Helmut Käutner, 1955) starring Erik Schumann and Horst Buchholz. With Romy Schneider and Buchholz, he acted in the historical drama Robinson soll nicht sterben/The Girl and the Legend (Josef von Báky,1957). As a synchronisation actor, Ponto dubbed English-language actors like Lionel Barrymore, Charles Laughton and Charley Grapewin in several films between the mid-1930s and early 1950s. He worked as an actor until shortly before his death. In 1916 he married Tony Kresse, and they had two children. Ponto also worked as an acting teacher, among his students was Gert Fröbe. Ponto's final film was Der Stern von Afrika/The Star of Africa (Alfred Weidenmann, 1957) starring Joachim Hansen. Erich Ponto died at the age of 72 after a long cancerous illness. He was the uncle of Dresdner Bank general director Jürgen Ponto, who was murdered by the RAF in 1977.
Sources: Wikipedia (German and English) and IMDb.
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German postcard by Photo-Kitt, München, no. 504. Photo: Kurt Julius / Camera Film.
Helmut Käutner (1908-1980) was one of the most influential and acclaimed directors of the German post-war cinema and he was known for his sophisticated literary film adaptations. He already began his career as an actor and cabaret artist at the end of the Weimar Republic and he directed his first major films in Nazi Germany.
Paul Günther Helmut Käutner was born in 1908 in Düsseldorf, Germany. He was the son of merchant Paul Läutner and his wife Claire, born Röntgen. In 1916, the family moved to Essen where Käutner attended Helmholtz-Realgymnasium and participated in school theatre performances. He studied graphics, costume design, set design, and interior design at the Kunstgewerbeschule. In 1928, he went to Munich's university to study German studies, philosophy, psychology, art history, and theatre studies. From 1931 to 1935 he wrote, directed and performed at the Munich Student Cabaret troupe Die vier Nachrichter (The Four Executioners). The literary and rather unpolitical group was banned in 1935 for "lack of reliability and aptitude according to national socialist governance". Käutner wrote feuilletons and reviews for the Bavarian university newspaper. In 1932, he made his film debut as an actor in Kreuzer Emden/Cruiser Emden (Louis Ralph, 1932), but after that experience he turned to the theatre again and also wrote songs. From 1936 to 1938 he worked as an actor and director at the Schauspielhaus in Leipzig, at the Kammerspielen in Munich, at the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm, at the Komödie and at the Kabarett der Komiker in Berlin. In 1938 he drew attention to himself as a screenwriter for such films as Schneider Wibbel/Wibbel the Tailor (Victor de Kowa, 1938), Salonwagen E 417 (Paul Verhoeven, 1938), Die Stimme aus dem Äther (Harald Paulsen, 1938) and Marguerite: 3 (Theo Lingen, 1938). In 1939 began his career as a film director with the light-hearted comedy Kitty und die Weltkonferenz/Kitty and the World Conference (1939), featuring Hannelore Schroth. Käutner was not a member of the resistance but, during the period of National Socialism, he was able to maintain a certain independence in his work. Kitty and the World Conference was withdrawn by the Nazi censors due to its “pro-English tendencies”. Käutner rejected the UFA filmmaking establishment and produced thoughtful and poetic works like Kleider machen Leute/Clothes Make the Man (1940) starring Heinz Rühmann, Auf Wiedersehen, Franziska!/Goodbye, Franziska! (1941), and Romanze in Moll/Romance in a Minor Key (1943) starring Marianne Hoppe and Paul Dahlke. The latter was often seen as Käutner’s best film of this period. Romanze in Moll is an adaptation of Guy du Maupassant’s short story Les Bijoux. A somewhat traditional love-triangle story, the film was praised for its compositional perfection and technical virtuosity. Käutner’sfilms considered the struggles of the German people during a period of great turmoil. With Große Freiheit Nr. 7/Great Freedom No. 7 (1944) with Hans Albers, and Unter den Brücken/Unter the Bridges (1945) with Hannelore Schroth and Carl Raddatz, he created two films which, in their emphasis on the individual, strongly opposed the world view of the national socialists. Käutner’s work was noted for its more humanistic depiction of daily life than his contemporaries. Große Freiheit Nr. 7 is a melancholy, bittersweet story of disappointed love set amongst the sailors' clubs and bars of the Hamburg waterfront. The film title, which refers to a street next to Hamburg's Reeperbahn road in the St. Pauli red light district, caused a furor among the Nazis who feared that audiences would misinterpret the film’s meaning. As a result, the film was banned in Germany until the fall of the Third Reich. Unter den Brücken, which is set amongst the bargees of the River Havel, is now considered one of the greatest love stories in the history of German cinema. Käutner’s avoidance of overt political content in his films during the war, allowed him to continue his career unhindered after 1945.
In 1947 Helmut Käutner’s made the first German film after WWII, the Trümmerfilm In jenen Tagen/In Those Days (1947) with Gert E. Schäfer, Erich Schellow and Winnie Markus. The film which describes the post-war reality and people overwhelmed and traumatized by the impact of fascism, was a great success and launched the new German film. Käutner used the framing device of an automobile whose various owners serve as the film’s protagonists and initiate its episodic structure. In the next years he directed such films such as Der Apfel ist ab /The Original Sin (1948) and Königskinder/Royal Children (1950). He was acclaimed for these socially conscious, often starkly realistic post-war films, which depicted the plight of the common man, struggling with the traumatic effects of the war and its aftermath. However, the films were no audience successes. In 1954, he won the Prix International at the Cannes film festival for his stark, realistic anti-war drama Die letzte Brücke/The Last Bridge (1954). In the following years, he had great successes with Ludwig II: Glanz und Ende eines Konigs,(1955) and the Carl Zuckmayer adaptations Des Teufels General/The Devil’s General (1954), with Curd Jürgens, Der Hauptmann von Köpenick/The Captain from Kopenick (1956) with Heinz Rühmann and Der Schinderhannes (1958), again with Curd Jürgens. In 1956, Der Hauptmann von Köpenick was nominated for the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film at the 29th Academy Awards. Another international success was Monpti/Love from Paris (1957) , starring Romy Schneider and Horst Buchholz. Käutner moved to Hollywood and produced two films for Universal: the family melodrama The Restless Years (1958) and A Stranger in My Arms (1959), with Charles Coburn and Sandra Dee. He soon returned to West-Germany and made Der Rest ist Schweigen/The Rest Is Silence (1959), a modern-day retelling of Hamlet, starring Hardy Krüger. He did not feel a connection with the Oberhausen Manifesto of 1962 or the New German Cinema, and Käutner distanced himself more and more from the cinema. His final feature films were Das Haus in Montevideo/The House in Montevideo (1963) with Heinz Rühmann and Ruth Leuwerik, Lausbubengeschichten/Tales of a Young Scamp (1964) and the remake of Der Feuerzangenbowle/The Fire Tongue Bowl (1970), with Walter Giller and Uschi Glas. He began to work for television and occasionally he appeared as an actor. In addition, he also increasingly directed for the theatre. In 1967, he received the Adolf-Grimme-Preis for his television production of Valentin Katayev, produced at the Saarland Radio, surgical interventions in the soul life of Dr. Igor Igorowitsch . In 1974 he played the title role in Hans-Jürgen Syberberg's feature film Karl May. Helmut Käutner also worked for radio Hamburg. Since 1934, he had been married to the actress Erica Balqué who later was assistant director for almost all his films. His last years of life, already seriously ill, he spent with his wife in Tuscany in his house in Castellina in Chianti, in the north of the province of Siena. There he died in 1980 at the age of 72.
Sources: Julian Petley (Film Reference), Filmportal.de, Harvard Film Archive, Encyclopædia Britannica, Wikipedia (German and English), and IMDb.
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German postcard by Kitt Fotokarten / Photo Kitt, München. Photo: Kurt Julius / Camera Film / Herzog. Publicity still for In jenen Tagen/Seven Journeys (Helmut Käutner, 1947).
German actor Fritz Wagner (1915-1982) was a handsome star in the European cinema of the 1940s and 1950s. From 1938 to 1976, he appeared in more than sixty films and TV productions.
Friedrich Karl Wagner was born in 1915 in Heilbronn, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. His father, Karl Friedrich Wagner, worked in a cinema. Fritz attended drama classes from Elly Förster. Then followed first parts in the theatres in Stuttgart, München and Berlin, at the Volksbühne and Hebbel-Theater. In 1938, Fritz started his film career with bit roles, including one in the Nazi propaganda film Stukas (Karl Ritter, 1941). Wagner played supporting roles in the drama Mit den Augen einer Frau/With the Eyes of a Woman (Karl Georg Külb, 1942) starring the sisters Ada and Olga Tschechowa, and the comedy Sophienlund (Heinz Rühmann, 1943) starring Harry Liedtke. After the war, he played a leading role in the drama Freies Land/A Free Country (Milo Harbich, 1946) the second film of the newly founded DEFA studio in the Soviet occupation zone which later became East Germany. The propaganda film portrayed the effects of land reforms brought in by the Soviet authorities. It would be the only DEFA film until the mid-1950s that dealt with the hardships of East-Germany's rural life, and was heavily influenced by the Italian Neorealism of that time. Most people in the film weren't professional actors but farmers. The film proved to be very unsuccessful on its release. Between 1946 and 1949, Wagner was also one of the faces of the West-German Trümmerfilme, produced in Hamburg in the British Zone in the wake of Germany's defeat during World War II. He appeared in one of the episodes of In jenen Tagen/Seven Journeys (Helmut Käutner, 1947), about the story of a car and its seven owners during the years of the Third Reich. The film's objective was to highlight the private resistance of various figures to the Nazis even while they publicly accepted the repression of Nazi society. In jenen Tagen was well received by the German public and gives an early display of the talent of Helmut Käutner, who both directed and wrote the film. Wagner also had a supporting part in the romantic comedy Film ohne Titel/Film Without Title (Rudolf Jugert, 1948), starring Hans Söhnker and Hildegard Knef. It is an interesting reflection about the rights to be entertained after WWII: which stories can be told, when all stories seem to have been finished? It shows the attempts of a film crew to shoot a film. Herbert Schwaab at IMDb: "The film is entertaining and modern as well. Unfortunately questions of film form were not to be touched again until the seventies." For the DEFA, he also played a leading role in the war drama Die Brücke/The Bridge (Arthur Pohl, 1949), and in Der Kahn der fröhlichen Leute (Hans Heinrich, 1950) which sold more than 4,100,000 tickets.
During the 1950s, Fritz Wagner was one of the well knownfaces of the German and Austrian cinema. He starred opposite Ingrid Lutz in the crime film Großstadtgeheimnis/ Big City Secret (Leo de Laforgue, 1952). he often had supporting parts such as in the satire Der Hauptmann und sein Held/The Captain and His Hero (Max Nosseck, 1955) or Eine Frau genügt nicht?/One Woman Is Not Enough? (Ulrich Erfurth, 1955), with Hilde Krahl and Hans Söhnker. At the end of the 1950s, his roles became smaller. His later films include the crime drama Banktresor 713/Bank Vault 713 (Werner Klingler, 1957) with Martin Held and Hardy Krüger, and the crime film Der Greifer/The Copper (Eugen York, 1958) with Hans Albers. His final feature film was the Theo Lingen comedy Bei Pichler stimmt die Kasse nicht/Pichler's Books Are Not in Order (Hans Quest, 1961). During the 1960s he worked for television, and he was last seen of screen in the mini-series Alle Jahre wieder: Die Familie Semmeling/Every year again: the Semmeling family (1976). From 1945 on, Wagner worked often for the radio, and appeared in many radio plays till 1970. He also gave acting classes. Wagner was probably homosexual. Gottfried Lorenz describes in his book 'Töv, di schiet ik an: Beiträge zur Hamburger Schwulengeschichte' how he was named in a 'theatre scandal' around actor Karl Stoll in 1941 and 1942. I guess his sexuality probably hurt his film career during the 1950s. Fritz Wagner died of cancer in 1982 in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, West Germany. He was 66.
Sources: Gottfried Lorenz (Töv, di schiet ik an: Beiträge zur Hamburger Schwulengeschichte), Wikipedia and IMDb.
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German postcard by Kitt photokarten, München, no. 606. Photo: United Artists. Collection: Marlene Pilaete.
On 29 August 2022, a La Collectionneuse post on Jennifer Jones will be published on our blog European Film Star Postcards.
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German postcard by Photo-Kitt, München, no. 503. Photo: Camera Film / Kurt Julies / Herzog.
Hans Nielsen (1911-1965) was a German actor and assistant director. He was known for such films as Titanic (1943), Nachtwache/Keepers of the Night (1949) and Town Without Pity (1961). He appeared in more than 130 films between 1937 and 1965
Hans Albert Nielsen was born on 30 November 1911 as the son of a merchant in Hamburg, Germany. After attending secondary school he took an apprenticeship as a merchant,. He only completed it for the sake of his parents, because he took acting lessons with Albrecht Schoenhals and Erich Ziegel and also trained in singing. In 1932, Nielsen made his theatre debut at the Hamburger Kammerspiele. Further engagements took him to Augsburg, Kiel and Leipzig in the following months. Many actors and performing artists fled Nazi Germany, but Nielsen remained. In 1938, Nielsen went to Berlin and performed at various theatres. The talented actor had already attracted the attention of the film industry in the mid-1930s and Nielsen made his screen debut with a small part in the romantic comedy Daphne und der Diplomat/Daphne and the Diplomat (Robert A. Stemmle, 1937) in the same year he appeared as pilot Billy Sefton in the melodrama Tango Notturno (Fritz Kirchhoff, 1937). A year later, he took on the role of Max von Wendlowsky in the Zarah Leander film Heimat (Carl Froelich, 1938), based on the play by Hermann Sudermann. Productions such as the initially banned historical drama Preußische Liebesgeschichte/A Prussian Love Story (Paul Martin, 1938), the adventure Aufruhr in Damaskus/Uproar in Damascus (Gustacv Ucicky, 1939), and the crime thriller Alarm auf Station III/Alarm at Station III (Philipp Lothar Mayring, 1939) followed until the end of the 1930s. In the 1940s, Nielsen appeared in the euthanasia drama Ich klage an/I Accuse (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1941) as Dr Höfer, which is still considered a ”reserved film’ today. In the drama Titanic (Herbert Selpin, 1943) about the sinking of the luxury liner RMS Titanic in 1912, Nielsen played the German first officer Petersen. Titanic was commissioned by Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels with the intent of showing not only the superiority of German filmmaking but also as a propaganda vehicle which would depict British and American capitalism as being responsible for the disaster. The addition of an entirely fictional heroic German officer, Petersen, to the ship's crew, was intended to demonstrate the superior bravery and selflessness of German men as compared to the British officers. The film's original director, Herbert Selpin, was arrested during production after making disparaging comments about the German army and the war in the East. He was found hanged in prison, and the film was completed by Werner Klingler, who was not credited. Although the film had a brief theatrical run in parts of German-occupied Europe starting in November 1943, it was not shown within Germany by order of Goebbels, who feared that it would weaken the German citizenry's morale instead of improving it, as heavy Allied bombing raids made a film depicting mass panic and death unappealing. Goebbels later banned the playing of the film entirely, and it did not have a second run. Until the end of the war, Nielsen appeared in productions including the drama Der große König/The Great King (Veit Harlan, 1942) starring Otto Gebühr. The comedy Dr. Phil. Döderlein (1945) remained unfinished.
After the end of the Second World War, Hans Nielsen was able to continue his earlier successes on the big screen with mostly high-profile supporting roles, but also leading roles. He appeared, for example, as King Peter Petroni in the comedy of mistaken identity Herzkönig/King of Hearts (Helmut Weiss, 1947) and as Wolfgang Grunelius in the episodic film In jenen Tagen/In Those Days (1947) directed by Helmuth Käutner. It was one of the Rubble films made in the wake of Germany's defeat during World War II. In 1949, he shone alongside Luise Ullrich and Dieter Borsche in the drama Nachtwache/Keepers of the Night (Harald Braun, 1949). He impressively portrayed the pastor Johannes Heger, who finds himself in a conflict of conscience. In 1950, he was seen in the role of chief inspector Thomsen in Kurt Hoffmann's crime thriller Fünf unter Verdacht/Five Suspects (1950), based on the novel ‘Thomas verhört die Prima’ by Herbert Moll and Rudolf Becker. He often played good-natured, likeable and elegant roles, like the presiding judge in the satire Hokuspokus/Hocuspocus (Kurt Hoffmann, 1953). He usually appeared older in his roles than he was, often playing the benevolent head of the family. However, many of the productions in which Nielsen appeared were successful not least because of him. In the criminal melodrama Teufel in Seide/Devil in Silk (Rolf Hansen, 1955) with Lilli Palmer and Curd Jürgens, he was the committed defence lawyer, as well as in the legal drama Gestehen Sie, Dr. Corda!/Confess, Doctor Corda! (Josef von Báky, 1958) with Hardy Krüger and Kriegsgericht/Court Martial (Kurt Meisel, 1959), based on the story ‘Kreuzer Pommern’ by Willi Berthold with Karlheinz Böhm, Christian Wolff and Klaus Kammer as three shipwrecked German marines. In Wolfgang Liebeneiner's romanticised historical film Königin Luise/Queen Luise (1957), he lent character to Minister Karl August von Hardenberg alongside Ruth Leuwerik as Queen Luise. His role as Max Mertens in Anders als du und ich/Different from You and Me (Veit Harlan, 1957) is rather negligible. As Filmdienst.de notes: ‘The film by no means sees homosexuality as a positive alternative to life, and also defames abstract painting and atonal music, which it portrays as the expression of such an ‘attitude to life’.’ Nielsen did not become a real screen star in German post-war films, probably because he was confined to the type of dignified grand seigneur, the ‘actor of sober businessmen and grumpy but spirited clergymen’, as one critic once described him.
Hans Nielsen founded a cabaret group, ‘Die Außenseiter’ (The Outsider) after the war, and appeared in revues by Günter Neumann. Engagements took him to the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus, the Renaissance Theatre and the Theater am Kurfürstendamm in Berlin, among others. One of his most important theatre roles was that of the Cardinal in the 1963 premiere of Rolf Hochhuth's play ‘Der Stellvertreter’, directed by Erwin Piscator at Berlin's Theater am Kurfürstendamm, with Dieter Borsche as Pope Pius XII. During the 1960s, he also appeared in films like Sherlock Holmes und das Halsband des Todes/Sherlock Holmes and the Deadly Necklace (Terence Fisher, 1963) with Christopher Lee, Scotland Yard jagt Dr. Mabuse/Scotland Yard Hunts Dr. Mabuse or Scotland Yard vs. Dr Mabuse (Paul May, 1963) starring Peter van Eyck, and Das indische Touch/The Indian Scarf (Alfred Vohrer, 1963). His only Hollywood film was Town Without Pity (Gottfried Reinhardt, 1961) with Kirk Douglas. In addition to his extensive acting work for theatre and film, Hans Nielsen was also a sought-after dubbing actor. He was the German voice of Errol Flynn, Tyrone Power, Trevor Howard, James Stewart, Fred Astaire and Spencer Tracy. His final film was the Western Die Hölle von Manitoba/The Hell of Manitoba (Sheldon Reynolds, 1965) starring Lex Barker and Pierre Brice. Hans Nielsen died in 1965 in West Berlin at the age of just 53. He had previously been admitted to hospital with back problems and was diagnosed with leukaemia on examination. The popular act or was laid to rest in the Heerstraße Cemetery in the Berlin district of Westend. The actor had been married to Anna Katharina Elisabeth Novian since 1937; despite having a daughter together, the marriage failed. After the divorce, Nielsen married his second wife Annemarie Giersch, who brought a son into the marriage. Wife number 3 was Jutta Jusseit. The couple married a few months before his death in 1965. In 2023, film historian Thomas Barthol published a biography of the artist entitled ‘Hans Nielsen: Der charmante Kavalier’, who never played in the top league of film stars, but ‘knew how to convince with his acting and vocal skills’.
Sources: Stephanie D’heil (Steffi-Line), Wikipedia, and IMDb.
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