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This elegant actor of the golden age of German cinema appeared in several masterpieces, before the cameras of such inspired geniuses as Lang, Lubitsch and Murnau. Vocation had come rather late in his life, though. Abel was indeed already 33 when he made his first film. Beforehand, he had been a forester, a gardener and a shopkeeper. But one day, while watching a film with Asta Nielsen, he was struck by revelation. He decided at once to become an actor and with the help of Nielsen in person he started a fruitful screen career. He also wrote and directed a few films. He died too soon aged only 57, but having honored the German screen with his noble, dignified figure in more than a hundred pictures.- Actor
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An English actor active in the theater since 1961, having made few theatrical movies, none of which particularly outstanding, with the exception of John Boorman's Zardoz (1974) and Nigel Cole's popular Calendar Girls (2003), John Alderton has become famous thanks to British television. Appearing in approximately two hundred TV series episodes, TV movies or specials, he is best remembered as the teacher facing the rowdy students in the series Please Sir! (1968), from 1968 to 1972, Thomas, the chauffeur, in Upstairs, Downstairs (1971), between 1971 and 1975, and the narrator and sole voice artist for the English dub of Fireman Sam (1987) from 1987 to 1994.- Born in 1927, Roland Alexandre started his adult (and professional) life under favorable auspices. Young (he was only 22 when he joined the prestigious Comédie-Française), handsome (L'Aurore, a French newspaper described him as having a wonderful physical appearance and a fantastic charm), gifted (the same paper praised his clear singular voice and his presence) and in love with Juliette Greco, the famous singer, he had everything. But the fairy tale suddenly turned sour when the "cherished child of the gods" took his own life at the age of 28. A sad (and premature) ending for a young man who could have become a new Gérard Philipe. However, for all the brevity of his career, Roland Alexandre had had time to star in nearly twenty plays signed André Gide, William Shakespeare, Jean Racine, Victor Hugo, Molière and Alfred de Musset as well as to appear in ten movies in France and abroad. His best remembered roles in the movies were that of Jacques Morhange, a young intern, godson of a famous surgeon (Pierre Fresnay) in Yves Ciampi's Perfectionist (1951) and Armand Duval in Raymond Bernard's version of A Lady with Camelias (1953). But his real shining hours were on the boards when he performed such difficult (and rewarding) roles as Lafcadio in "Les caves du Vatican", Britannicus in 'Racine's play of the same name, Perdican in "On ne badine pas avec l'amour" and Clitandre in "Les femmes savantes". Roland Alexandre, a man who had everything but who said no to life. How sad.
- Shane is a Welsh actor. He is currently playing Chief Hopper in Stranger Things The First Shadow.His career has been both diverse and prolific. Along side work in the Film and TV industry he has appeared in numerous West End Theatre productions and voiced hundreds of VO projects. Working alongside directors including Trevor Nunn, Ridley Scott, Clio Barnard and Rupert Goold, his work has ranged from Arthur Miller's Death of A Salesman at The Lyric on Shaftesbury Avenue to Porgy and Bess at The Royal Opera House, Olivier winning play Piaf with Jamie Lloyd and the Almeida's game changing The Last Days of Judas Iscariot where his portrayal of Butch Honeywell brought him much critical acclaim. His first lead role in Andrew Kotting's visionary film This Filthy Earth challenged the rules and boundaries of the archetypal film making format and laid the foundations for his love of experimental film. His most recent roles have seen a foray into the super hero world in Wonder Woman 1984, the agricultural poverty in Barnard's Dark River and the violent underworld of Ronnie and Reggie Kray as George Cornell in Legend. Always with a strong emphasis on character, he has been involved in the fantastical worlds of The Witcher, Carnival Row, The Bastard Executioner, The Alienist and countless productions for British television, including most recently as the thuggish Rocky in Finders Keepers for Channel 5.
- Christoph Bantzer was born on 4 January 1936 in Marburg, Hesse, Germany. He is an actor, known for Funny Games (1997), Wer zu spät kommt - Das Politbüro erlebt die deutsche Revolution (1990) and Mozart (1982).
- Norman Bowler was born on 1 August 1932 in London, England, UK. He is an actor, known for Emmerdale Farm (1972), Softly Softly: Task Force (1969) and The Avengers (1961).
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Kenneth Charles Branagh was born on December 10, 1960, in Belfast, Northern Ireland, to parents William Branagh, a plumber and carpenter, and Frances (Harper), both born in 1930. He has two siblings, William Branagh, Jr. (born 1955) and Joyce Branagh (born 1970). When he was nine, his family escaped The Troubles by moving to Reading, Berkshire, England. At 23, Branagh joined the Royal Shakespeare Company, where he took on starring roles in "Henry V" and "Romeo and Juliet". He soon found the RSC too large and impersonal and formed his own, the Renaissance Theatre Company, which now counts Prince Charles as one of its royal patrons. At 29, he directed Henry V (1989), where he also co-starred with his then-wife, Emma Thompson. The film brought him Best Actor and Best Director Oscar nominations. In 1993, he brought Shakespeare to mainstream audiences again with his hit adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing (1993), which featured an all-star cast that included, among others, Denzel Washington, Michael Keaton and Keanu Reeves. At 30, he published his autobiography and, at 34, he directed and starred as "Victor Frankenstein" in the big-budget adaptation of Mary Shelley's novel, Frankenstein (1994), with Robert De Niro as the monster himself. In 1996, Branagh wrote, directed and starred in a lavish adaptation of Hamlet (1996). His superb film acting work also includes a wide range of roles such as in Celebrity (1998), Wild Wild West (1999), The Road to El Dorado (2000), Valkyrie (2008) and his stunning portrayal of Laurence Olivier in My Week with Marilyn (2011), where once again he offered a great performance that was also nominated for an Academy Award.- Actor
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This lean, incisive, basso-voiced Swiss actor with the unsettling mephistophelean countenance was the son of a Galician-Jewish merchant. Pinkas Braun began his chosen vocation at the age of eighteen as an extra with the Zürcher Schauspielhaus (embracing what he considered the 'order and discipline' inherent in a theatrical career). A member of the company's ensemble from 1945 to 1956, Braun featured in numerous premieres of plays by Brecht (who played a pivotal role in his training as an actor), Camus, Dürrenmatt and Frisch. Braun's personal favorite and his critically most acclaimed performance was as Shylock in Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice". On the screen, his looks and voice naturally predetermined him for arch villainy. At the very least, he would be cast as sinister schemers, occasionally mitigated by a charming blend of rascality. Braun found his widest audience during the 1960's in several lurid adaptations of crime thrillers by Edgar Wallace which have since acquired a substantial cult following: Secret of the Red Orchid (1962) (as a wealthy orchid collector and blackmail victim); The Door with Seven Locks (1962) (as the criminally insane Dr. Staletti); Der Fluch der gelben Schlange (1963) (Fing-Su, demonic leader of a murderous sect of Chinese snake-worshippers). At his scene-stealing best, Braun took full acting honours as the ruthless Percyval Glyde in a superbly-mounted TV mini-series, Die Frau in Weiß (1971), based on the classic novel by Wilkie Collins. As the owner of a distinctively sonorous voice he was guaranteed regular employment in radio drama or for synchronisation (notably, as William of Baskerville, chief protagonist of Umberto Eco's "The Name of the Rose"). Braun also established a reputation as a theatrical director of note and as the leading translator into German of the complete works of Edward Albee.- Actor
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Arthur Brauss has accumulated an impressive tally of acting credits, both on the domestic front and internationally. He has been directed by the likes of John Huston, Sam Peckinpah, Jack Arnold, Richard Brooks and Mark Robson. His co-stars have included Warren Beatty, Goldie Hawn, Steve Martin, Burt Lancaster, James Mason and James Coburn. Tall, lean and sinewy, he has played his fair share of police officers on TV, but, for the most part, his stock-in-trade have been ruthless henchmen, double-dealing scoundrels, assassins, bank robbers and mercenaries.
An accomplished pole-vaulter in his youth (1954 German junior champion), he was a factory worker before a move to the U.S. on a sports scholarship from the University of Wyoming. There, he studied maths and economics and discovered an affinity for acting while on the college stage. Brauss returned to Germany in 1960, his fluency in English helping him find work with Radio Free Europe. As 'Art Brauss', he made his film debut three years later. From the beginning, he was heavily in demand for supporting roles in international productions: mainly action films like The Train (1964), Jack of Diamonds (1967), The Swiss Conspiracy (1976), Avalanche Express (1979) and Cross of Iron (1977). Brauss also featured in a couple of Jerry Cotton potboilers, played the member of a terrorist gang in Verrat ist kein Gesellschaftsspiel (1972), cold-blooded killer Abdul Carraco in the expensively made TV production Härte 10 (1974) and Charly Clayton, the avaricious owner of the Tivoli saloon in Lockruf des Goldes (1975) (a miniseries loosely based on works by Jack London). His role as vicious drug smuggler Candy Man in $ (1971) had originally been slated for Horst Frank, an actor with a similar predilection for villainous portrayals.
Brauss had a particularly prominent role as a murderous football player in Wim Wenders's off-beat, noirish crime drama The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick (1972). More recently, he has featured as Russian chess master Viktor Yurilivich in the thriller Knight Moves (1992) and as King Ottokar in the fairy tale König Drosselbart (2008). For much of the 60s and 70s, however, he was true to form as the perennial heavy in TV series like Die fünfte Kolonne (1963), Okay S.I.R. (1972), Derrick (1974), Tatort (1970) and The Old Fox (1977). Aside from occasional forays into such lighter entertainments as Münchner Geschichten (1974) or The Black Forest Hospital (1985), Brauss has achieved lasting audience popularity as the veteran Chief of Police Richard Block in the long-running procedural police series Großstadtrevier (1986).
In addition to acting, he has provided the German synchronizing voice for stars like David Warner, Robbie Coltrane, Scott Glenn, James Caan and Max von Sydow.
Post-retirement (in 2014), the actor has spent his newly found spare time racing cars, making furniture, playing classical guitar, cooking and playing golf in a club which includes Franz Beckenbauer among its members. He has resided for some four decades in the Munich district of Schwabing. His wife is Marie Poccolin.- Stuart Bunce was born on 21 October 1971 in London, England, UK. He is an actor, known for First Knight (1995), The Jury (2002) and The Gospel of John (2003).
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Wolfgang Büttner was born on 1 June 1912 in Rostock, Germany. He was an actor, known for The Longest Day (1962), Fitzcarraldo (1982) and Die Affaire Dreyfus (1968). He was married to Eleonore Noelle. He died on 18 November 1990 in Stockdorf, Gauting, Bavaria, Germany.- Actor
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Daniel Casey was born on 1 June 1972 in Stockton-on-Tees, County Durham, England, UK. He is an actor, known for Midsomer Murders (1997), Marchlands (2011) and Hex (2004). He has been married to Ellie since October 2005. They have two children.- Sardonic-looking English character actor, often seen in sullen or nefarious roles. John Michael Frederick Castle was born one of four siblings in Croydon, Surrey, and educated at Brighton College and Trinity College, Dublin. He did not, at first, pursue acting as his chosen profession. Instead, he held down diverse short-term jobs, including as clerks, a hotel waiter, travel agent, salesman, landscape gardener and geography teacher. Eventually persuaded by his wife to resume acting training, he enrolled at RADA on a scholarship, graduating in 1964. Castle made his theatrical debut that year as Westmoreland in Henry V and as Lucentio in The Taming of the Shrew, both at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre in London. He then went on a six months-long tour of the Far East with the New Shakespeare Company. Upon his return, he acted for a season with the Royal Court Theatre (1965-1966) and, in later years, with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Bristol Old Vic. He headlined as Gandhi in a 1982 stage production at the Tricycle Theatre (Richard Attenborough's motion picture was also released that same year). On screen from 1965, Castle has appeared in many a prestige production. However, despite his considerable screen presence and acting acumen, he has not been able to attain the stature of a Derek Jacobi or a Michael Gambon.
Castle's early screen credits included the powerful Oscar-winning acting piece The Lion in Winter (1968), in which he excelled as the cold, manipulative Geoffrey II, Duke of Brittany, fourth of the five sons of Peter O'Toole's Henry II. He portrayed Octavius in Charlton Heston's unsuccessful adaptation of Antony and Cleopatra (1972) and the brutish Agrippa Postumus (grandson of Octavius) in BBC's I, Claudius (1976). A natural casting choice for the classics and for period drama, Castle has appeared in Man of La Mancha (1972) (as the student Sanson Carrasco, who joins in the 'quest'), The Shadow of the Tower (1972) (as Thomas Flamank, co-leader of the 1497 Cornish rebellion), Lillie (1978) (as Prince Louis of Battenberg), The Life and Death of King John (1984) (the Earl of Salisbury) King David (1985) (as Abner, the cousin of King Saul and commander-in-chief of his army) and Gods and Generals (2003) (Confederate Brigadier General William N. Pendleton, nicknamed 'Old Penn').
Castle has been most typically cast in cold, unsympathetic parts, best exemplified by the likes of lecherous art teacher Teddy Lloyd (The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1978)), hit man Peter Crabbe (The Professionals (1977)), ruthless 'Rehab' commander Paul Mc Daggett (RoboCop 3 (1993)) and as the scowling, hard-hearted stage conjurer Nick Ollanton (Lost Empires (1986)) (a character whom the actor himself described as "a ghastly desolate creature whose only redeeming qualities are his love for his nephew and his total rejection of any authority other than his own." More recently, Castle appeared in a leading role as a rival heir to the estate of a deceased clergyman in The Tractate Middoth (2013), adapted from a short ghost story by M.R. James. He has, on occasion, worn the white hat, notably as Detective Inspector Craddock in Agatha Christie's Miss Marple: A Murder Is Announced (1985) and Miss Marple: The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side (1992). Very much the serious, dramatic thespian, he has rarely ventured into comedy.
Castle retired from acting in 2016. He has been married since 1963 to the novelist and screenwriter Maggie Wadey. - Actor
- Soundtrack
Mark Chao was born on 25 September 1984 in Taipei, Taiwan. He is an actor, known for Monga (2010), The Yin-Yang Master: Dream of Eternity (2020) and Chronicles of the Ghostly Tribe (2015). He has been married to Yuanyuan Gao since 5 June 2014. They have one child.- Sean Chapman was born on 2 June 1961 in Greenwich, London, England, UK. He is an actor, known for Hellraiser (1987), A Mighty Heart (2007) and Hellbound: Hellraiser II (1988).
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- Producer
Charlie Condou was born on 8 January 1973 in Hammersmith, London, England, UK. He is an actor and producer, known for Nathan Barley (2005), The Infinite Worlds of H.G. Wells (2001) and Fred Claus (2007). He has been married to Cameron Laux since 8 June 2015. They have two children.- Actor
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Joseph Harry Fowler Connick, Jr. was born in New Orleans, Louisiana. He is the son of Anita Frances (Levy), a lawyer and judge, and Harry Connick, Sr. (Joseph Harry Fowler Connick), who served as District Attorney of New Orleans from 1973 to 2003. His father is of Irish, English, and German ancestry, and his maternal grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Vienna, Austria and Minsk, Belarus. Harry, Jr.'s mother died of ovarian cancer when he was 13.
His parents owned a record store and encouraged their son's interest in music - piano at age three, with a New Orleans jazz band aged ten. He won piano competitions while playing French Quarter clubs and attending the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts. At eighteen, he studied at New York's Hunter College and later on at the Manhatan School of Music. At nineteen, he released his first album for Columbia Records and began an extended run performing at the Algonquin's Oak Room, followed a year later by his second album. He wrote the score and sang several songs for Rob Reiner's When Harry Met Sally... (1989), the soundtrack for which went multi-platinum. So far, while bringing back swing and big band music, he has earned one gold, four platinum and three multi-platinum albums, plus two Grammies. His film acting debut was as B-17 tail-gunner Clay Busby in Memphis Belle (1990). He played mass-murderer Daryll Lee Cullum in the Sigourney Weaver and Holly Hunter film Copycat (1995) and Captain Jimmy Wilder ("Let's kick the tires and light the fires, big daddy!") in Independence Day (1996).
Harry lives in Connecticut, is married to the former model Jill Goodacre, and has three daughters, Georgia Tatom, Sara Kate and Charlotte.- Actor
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Born to Alice Cooper and Charles Cooper. Gary attended school at Dunstable school England, Helena Montana and Grinnell College, Grinnell, Iowa (then called Iowa College). His first stage experience was during high school and college. Afterwards, he worked as an extra for one year before getting a part in a two-reeler by the independent producer Hans Tiesler . Eileen Sedgwick was his first leading lady. He then appeared in The Winning of Barbara Worth (1926) for United Artists before moving to Paramount. While there he appeared in a small part in Wings (1927), It (1927), and other films.- Actor
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Joseph Cheshire Cotten, Jr. was born in Petersburg, Virginia, into a well-to-do Southern family. He was the eldest of three sons born to Sally Whitworth (Willson) and Joseph Cheshire Cotten, Sr., an assistant postmaster.
Jo (as he was known) and his brothers Whit and Sam spent their summers at their aunt and uncle's home at Virginia Beach. And there and at an early age he discovered a passion for story-telling, reciting, and performing acts for his family. Cotten studied acting at the Hickman School of Expression in Washington, D.C. and worked as an advertising agent afterward. But by 1924 tried to enter acting in New York. His money opportunities were limited to shipping clerk, and after a year of attempting stage work, he left with friends, heading for Miami. There he found a variety of jobs: lifeguard, salesman, a stint as entrepreneur -- making and selling 'Tip Top Potato Salad' - but more significantly, drama critic for the Miami Herald. That evidently led to appearance in plays at the Miami Civic Theater. Through a connection at the Miami Herald he managed to land an assistant stage manager job in New York. In 1929 he was engaged for a season at the Copley Theatre in Boston, and there he was able to expand his acting experience, appearing in 30 plays in a wide variety of parts. By 1930 he made his Broadway debut. In 1931 Cotten married Lenore LaMont (usually known as Kipp), a pianist, divorced with a four-year-old daughter.
To augment his income as an actor in the mid-30s, Cotten took on radio shows in addition to his theatre work. At one audition he met an ambitious, budding actor/writer/director/producer with a mission to make his name-Orson Welles. Cotten was 10 years his senior, but the two found a kindred spirit in one another. For Cotten, Welles association would completely redirect his serious acting life. Their early co-acting attempts boded ill for employment in formal acting vehicles. At a rehearsal for CBS radio the two destroyed a scene taking place on a rubber tree plantation. One or the other was supposed to say the line: "Barrels and barrels of pith...." They could not overcome uncontrolled laughter at each attempt. The director berated them as acting like 'school-children' and 'unprofessional', and thereafter both were considered unreliable. Welles's ambition put that quickly behind them when he formed The Mercury Theatre Players. Coming on board were later Hollywood stalwarts: Everett Sloane, Agnes Moorehead, Ruth Warrick, and Ray Collins. In 1937, Cotten starred in Welles's Mercury productions of "Julius Caesar" and "Shoemaker's Holiday". And he made his film debut in the Welles-directed short Too Much Johnson (1938), a comedy based on William Gillette's 1890 play. The short was occasionally screened before or after Mercury productions, but never received an official release. Cotten returned to Broadway in 1939, starring as C.K. Dexter Haven in the original production of Philip Barry's "The Philadelphia Story". The uproar over Welles's "War of the Worlds" radio broadcast, was rewarded with an impressive contract from RKO Pictures. The two-picture deal promised full creative control for the young director, and Welles brought his Mercury players on-board in feature roles in what he chose to bring to the screen. But after a year, nothing had germinated until Welles met with writer Herman J. Mankiewicz, resulting in the Citizen Kane (1941) idea - early 1940. The story of a slightly veiled William Randolph Hearst with Welles as Kane and Cotten, in his Hollywood debut, as his college friend turned confidant and theater critic, Jed Leland, would become film history, but at the time it caused little more than a ripple. Hearst owned the majority of the country's press outlets and so forbade advertisements for the film. The film was nominated for nine Academy Awards in 1942 but was largely ignored by the Academy, only winning for Best Screenplay for Welles and Mankiewicz.
The following year Cotten and Welles collaborated again in The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), acclaimed but again ignored at Oscar time, and the next year's Nazi thriller Journey Into Fear (1943). Cotten, along with some Welles ideas, wrote the screenplay. Welles with his notorious overrunning of budgeting was duly dropped by RKO thereafter. Later in 1943 Cotten's exposure and acquaintance with young producer David O. Selznick resulted in a movie contract and the launching of his mainstream and very successful movie career as a romantic leading man. Thereafter he appeared with some of the most leading of Hollywood leading ladies - a favorite being Jennifer Jones, Selznick's wife with the two of them being his most intimate friends. Cotten got the opportunity to play a good range of roles through the 1940s - the darkest being the blue beard-like killer in Alfred Hitchcock thriller Shadow of a Doubt (1943) with Teresa Wright. Perhaps the most fun was The Farmer's Daughter (1947) with a vivacious Loretta Young. Cotten starred with Jennifer Jones in four films: the wartime domestic drama Since You Went Away (1944), the romantic drama Love Letters (1945), the western Duel in the Sun (1946), and later in the critically acclaimed Portrait of Jennie (1948), from the haunting Robert Nathan book. Cotten is thoroughly convincing as a second-rate, unmotivated artist who finds inspiration from a chance acquaintance budding into love with an incarnation of a girl who died years before. Welles and Cotten did not work again until The Third Man (1949), directed by Carol Reed. For Cotten, the role as the hapless boyhood friend and second-rate novel writer Holly Martins would be a defining moment in a part both comedic and bittersweet, its range making it one of his best performances. Unfortunately, he was again overlooked for an Oscar.
Cotten was kept in relative demand into his mature acting years. Into the 1950s, he reunited with "Shadow Of A Doubt" co star Thereas Wright, to do the memorable bank caper "The Steel Trap"(1952).He co stared with Jean Peters in "Blueprint For A Murder"(1953). For the most part, the movie roles were becoming more B than A. He had a brief role as a member of the Roman Senate, reuniting with lifelong friend Welles in his Othello (1951). There were a few film-noir outings along with the usual fare of the older actor with fewer roles. However, he was much more successful in returning to theater roles in the new television playhouse format. He also did some episodic TV and some series ventures, as with On Trial, which was later called The Joseph Cotten Show. He had a memorable role in an Alfred Hitchcock Presents, "Breakdown", where he was a man in a lone and isolated car accident, trapped and unable to speak. He voices over and shows his great acting skill simply through facial expressions. His one last stint with Welles was uncredited and sort of Jed Leland-revisited as the hokey coroner early in Welles's over-the-top Touch of Evil (1958). Of his association with Welles, Cotten said: "Exasperating, yes. Sometimes eruptive, unreasonable, ferocious, yes. Eloquent, penetrating, exciting, and always - never failingly even at the sacrifice of accuracy and at times his own vanity - witty. Never, never, never dull."
With the passing of his first wife in 1960 Cotten met and married British actress Patricia Medina. The 1960s found him equally busy in TV and film. He made the circuit of the most popular detective and cowboy series of the period. By 1964 he returned to film with the money making old-Hollywood-dame- horror-movie genre hit Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964) with other vintage Hollywood legends Bette Davis, Olivia de Havilland, and Agnes Moorehead. His other films of that decade were of the quick entertainment variety along with some foreign productions, and TV movies. There were also more TV series and guests appearances, especially The Ed Sullivan Show, a popular stop during its long run. In the 1970s Cotten was still in demand-for even more of the curiosity-appeal of the populace for an older star. Along with the new assortment of TV series, he anchored himself at Universal with small parts in forgettable movies, the sluggish Universal epic dud Tora! Tora! Tora! for instance, and the steady diet of TV series being cranked out there. Though older actors have laughed in public about their descent into cheap horror movies, one can only wonder at the impetus to do them -- by such greats, as Claude Rains -- besides a can't-pass-up alluring salary.
Cotten did the campy The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971) with Vincent Price and about that time two second rate Italian horror outings where he was Baron Blood and Baron Frankenstein. Then again there was better exposure in the Universal minor sci-fi classic Soylent Green (1973). And in yet another Universal sequel, where the profit-logic was to gather a cast of veterans from the Hollywood spectrum in any situation spelling disaster and watch the ticket sales skyrocket, Cotten joined the all-star cast of Airport '77 (1977). He rounded out the decade with the ever faddish Fantasy Island and more Universal TV rounds. This contributor met and worked with Joseph Cotten during this latter evolution of one of Hollywood's greats. He wore his own double-breasted blue blazer and tan slacks in several roles - no need for wardrobe. His pride and joy was a blue 1939 Jaguar SS, something of a fixture on the Universal lot.
Cotten was not ready to turn his back on Hollywood until the beginning of the 1980s when he managed to appear in the epic flop Heaven's Gate (1980). After a Love Boat episode (1981), Cotten joined his wife and his love of gardening and entertaining friends in retirement. He also had the time to write an engaging autobiography Vanity Will Get You Somewhere (1987). Cotten's somewhat matter-of-fact and seemingly gruff acting voice served him well. Certainly his command of varied roles deserved more than the snub of never being nominated for an Academy Award. He was not the only actor to suffer being underrated, but that is largely forgotten in those memorable roles that speak for him. And for what it is worth, the Europeans had the very good sense to award him the Venice Film Festival Award for Best Actor for Portrait of Jennie, one of his favorite roles.- Actor
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Ivor Dean was born on 21 December 1917 in Edmonton, London, England, UK. He was an actor and writer, known for Dr Jekyll & Sister Hyde (1971), The Saint (1962) and My Partner the Ghost (1969). He was married to Patricia Hamilton. He died on 10 August 1974 in Truro, Cornwall, England, UK.- Director
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Born in Ludwigshafen, Germany, Wilhelm Dieterle was the youngest of nine children of parents Jacob and Berthe Dieterle. They lived in poverty, and when he was old enough to work, young Wilhelm earned money as a carpenter and a scrap dealer. He dreamed of better things, though, and theater caught his eye as a teen. By the age of 16 he had joined a traveling theater company. He was ambitious and handsome, both of which opened the door to leading romantic roles in theater productions. Though he had acted in his first film in 1913, it was six more years before he made another one. In that year he was noticed by producer/director/designer/impresario Max Reinhardt, the most influential proponent of expressionism in theater; while in Berlin, Reinhardt hired him as an actor for his productions. Dieterle resumed German film acting in 1920, becoming a popular and successful romantic lead and featured character actor in the mix of German expressionist/Gothic and nature/romanticism genres that imbued much of German cinema in the silent era. He was interested in directing even more than acting, however, and he had the iconic Reinhardt to provide inspiration. Dieterle had acted in nearly 20 movies before he also began directing in 1923, his first female lead being a young Marlene Dietrich.
With his wife Charlotte Hagenbruch he started his own film production . He was said to have tired of acting; he appeared in nearly 50 films over the course of his career, mainly in the 1920s, and in several of his films he also functioned as director. As an actor he worked with some of the greatest names in German film, such as directors Paul Leni (in Waxworks (1924) [Waxworks]) and F.W. Murnau (in Faust (1926)) and actors Conrad Veidt and Emil Jannings. By 1930, however, he had emigrated to the US--now rechristened as William Dieterle--with an offer from Warner Brothers to direct their German-language versions of the studio's popular hits for the German market. In that capacity he made Those Who Dance (1930), The Way of All Men (1930) and Die heilige Flamme (1931) (aka "The Holy Flames"). He even stood before the camera for another of these, Dämon des Meeres (1931) (aka "Demon of the Sea", a version of "Moby Dick") in 1931, in which he played Capt. Ahab. The film was directed by another European who was soon to become one of Warners' most successful directors: the Hungarian Michael Curtiz.
Having taken to the Hollywood brand of filmmaking with ease--helped by his own brilliance in defining and executing the telling of a story--into 1931, he was soon promoted to directing some of Warners' "regular" films (his first, The Last Flight (1931), is now regarded as a masterwork) and he wold average directing six pictures a year for the studio through 1934. In that year Reinhardt came to the US, the Nazi threat finally having driven him off the Continent. He arrived with a flourish, ready to stage William Shakespeare's "A Midsummers Night's Dream"--an extravaganza at the Hollywood Bowl that would become legend. It was impressive enough to interest the execs of Warner Bros. They opted for a film version in 1935 with the great Reinhardt--even studio boss Jack L. Warner knew who he was--reunited with his disciple, Dieterle, as co-director. Reinhardt knew nothing about Hollywood and had to learn via Dieterle's diplomacy the differences between the overemphasis of stage and the subtlety of the camera. He learned from other directors as well about the realities of making films, in particular ratchet down the tendency that stage directors had to let their actors perform "too" much. It was all for naught, however, as the film was a major box-office flop, but it was one of the great moments in the evolution of film. Dieterle would direct Paul Muni for Warners in three first-rate bio movies: The Story of Louis Pasteur (1936), The Life of Emile Zola (1937) and Juarez (1939) and all received Oscar nominations. After that Dieterle moved on to do The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939) at RKO with Charles Laughton as Quasimodo. This was one of Dieterle's best efforts, both in its romantic style and the great dark scenes of the Parisian medieval underworld with dramatic minimal lighting that gave vent to his expressionist roots.
Through the 1940s Dieterle moved around among Hollywood's studios, turning out vigorously wrought pictures, such as his two 1940 bios with Edward G. Robinson at Warner's. He became associated with independent producer David O. Selznick and actor Joseph Cotten, first with his direction of I'll Be Seeing You (1944). His romantic fires as a director had been restoked, as it were, and kept burning in the subsequent series of films with them which included the wonderful acting talents of Selznick's soon-to-be-wife (1949), Jennifer Jones: Love Letters (1945), Duel in the Sun (1946)--for which he shared directing but not credit with King Vidor--and the ethereal Portrait of Jennie (1948). "Jennie" was one of Dieterle's masterpieces, bringing into play a fusion of all his artistic fonts. The romantic fantasy with edges of darkness from the novel by Robert Nathan was just the vehicle to challenge Dieterle. His use of light and dark and gauzed--at one point the textured field of a painting canvas--backdrops conveyed the dreamlike state and netherworld atmosphere of the story of lovers from different times. Certainly the film influenced others to follow with similar themes.
Through the 1950s Dieterle's work--two more with Joseph Cotten--though sturdily in the director's hands, came off like good Hollywood fare, but were inspired more by the films' tight shooting schedules than by any artistic pretensions. His output during that decade was small, and that was partly due to bane of McCarthyism. He was never blacklisted as such, but his film Blockade (1938) was too libertarian to keep him completely away from the shadow of suspicion as a "socialist" / "communist" sympathizer. In 1958 he returned to Germany and directed a few films there and in Italy before retiring in 1965.
Though regrettably not as well known as his German and European directorial compatriots in Hollywood, he had great artistic style and worked with much energy in providing some of Hollywood's and the world's crown jewels of cinematic art.- Marc Di Napoli was born on 28 May 1953. He is an actor, known for Tom Sawyers und Huckleberry Finns Abenteuer (1968), Moartea lui Joe Indianul (1968) and Two Years' Vacation (1974).
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Generally spoken of as Swedish theater's most legendary stage actor, Gösta Ekman enjoyed a prolific stage career during his short life, becoming the first real star of Swedish theater. His boyish good looks attracted both sexes, helping to create a massive cult following and elevating him to the status of a living legend. Combined with a beautiful voice and a powerful stage presence, Ekman was able to captivate his audiences.- Actor
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Former golden gloves boxer Ron Eldard has found success on stage, television and in feature films. Fans of the NBC medical drama ER (1994) will remember Eldard for playing a paramedic and love interest for nurse Julianna Margulies on the show's second season. The New York native graduated from the city's prestigious High School of the Performing Arts after studying drama and made his feature film debut in Nancy Savoca's True Love (1989). Eldard's subsequent major film roles include that of an inner city youth coping with the consequences of a practical joke gone horribly awry in Barry Levinson's Sleepers (1996). On stage, Eldard made a name for himself appearing in the off-Broadway productions of "AveNu Boys" and "Servy 'n' Bernice 4Ever" and, in his one man show, "Standing Eight Count". His Broadway credits include Neil Simon's "Biloxi Blues" and "On the Waterfront". On television, Eldard starred in the short-lived NBC sitcom Men Behaving Badly (1996) and in Bakersfield P.D. (1993). Eldard has also appeared in several made-for-television movies, including Showtime's Bastard Out of Carolina (1996) and HBO's When Trumpets Fade (1998).