Adolf Anton Wilhelm Wohlbrück (19 November 1896 – 9 August 1967) was an Austrian actor who settled in the United Kingdom under the name Anton Walbrook. A popular performer in Austria and pre-war Germany, he left Germany in 1936 out of concerns for his own safety and established a career in British cinema. Walbrook is perhaps best known for his roles in the original British film of Gaslight, The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, The Red Shoes and Victoria the Great (as Prince Albert).
Anton Walbrook | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Adolf Anton Wilhelm Wohlbrück 19 November 1896 Vienna, Austria-Hungary |
| Died | 9 August 1967 (aged 70) Starnberger See, Bavaria, West Germany |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | 1915–1966 |
Early life
editWalbrook was born in Vienna, Austria, as Adolf Wohlbrück.[1] He was the son of Gisela Rosa (Cohn) and Adolf Ferdinand Bernhard Hermann Wohlbrück.[2][3] He was descended from ten generations of actors, though his father broke with tradition and was a circus clown.[4] He attended a monastery school and considered becoming a monk, but eventually decided to become an actor.[4]
Wohlbrück moved to Berlin to study at the Deutsches Theater under Austro-German director Max Reinhardt. His career was temporarily interrupted by the First World War, during which he was captured in France and spent time in a POW camp.[5]
Career
editAfter the war, Wohlbrück built up a career in German theatre and cinema, with the support of his friend Hermine Körner.[6] In the 1930s he was one of Germany's most popular actors.[7] However, as the Nazis came to power, Wohlbrück realized that he could not stay in Germany for long, as he risked being persecuted by the Nazis due to his Jewish mother[8] and his homosexuality.[9] When Nazi Germany absorbed Austria in the 1938 Anschluss, the Austrian option was taken off the table as well.
In 1936, Wohlbrück went to Hollywood to reshoot dialogue for the 1937 multinational The Soldier and the Lady, in which he portrayed the Jules Verne hero Michael Strogoff, and changed his name from Adolf Wohlbrück to Anton Walbrook.[7] Ironically, due in part to his popularity in Germany (which persisted through the early parts of the Nazi regime), some German emigres in Hollywood suspected that he was a Nazi spy, and some Jewish-American groups threatened to boycott his films.[7] Although RKO convinced the Jewish organizations to lift the boycott by pointing out Walbrook's actual ethnic heritage, the damage was done.[10] He moved to London in 1937, settling down in an area with many German-speaking emigres. One of his neighbours was director Emeric Pressburger, who later cast him in some of his most famous roles.[10] He acquired British citizenship in 1947.[7]
In Britain, Walbrook continued working as an actor, specialising in playing continental Europeans. He "steer[ed] away from the dangerously sexy screen persona of his German career to the image of a passionate spokesman for pan-European liberalism."[11] He played Otto in the first London production of Design for Living at the Haymarket Theatre in January 1939 (later transferring to the Savoy Theatre), and running for 233 performances, opposite Diana Wynyard as Gilda and Rex Harrison as Leo.[12] In 1952 he appeared at the Coliseum as Cosmo Constantine in Call Me Madam, also participating alongside Billie Worth, Jeff Warren and Shani Wallis on the EMI cast recording.[13] Producer-director Herbert Wilcox cast him as Prince Albert in Victoria the Great (1937) and its sequel Sixty Glorious Years (1938). In Dangerous Moonlight (1941), a romantic melodrama, he was a Polish pianist torn over whether to return home.
Thorold Dickinson cast Walbrook in Gaslight (1940), in the role played by Charles Boyer in the later Hollywood remake. One of Walbrook's most unusual films was Dickinson's The Queen of Spades (1949), a Gothic thriller based on the Alexander Pushkin short story, in which he co-starred with Edith Evans.
In 1941 Walbrook began collaborating with Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, for which he is now best remembered. In 49th Parallel (1941) he played a leader of a Hutterite community in Canada. In The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943) he played the role of the dashing, intense military officer Theo Kretschmar-Schuldorff, a sympathetic German refugee from the Nazi regime. He also portrayed the tyrannical ballet impresario Lermontov in The Red Shoes (1948). His Red Shoes co-star Moira Shearer recalled Walbrook was a loner on set, often wearing dark glasses, as in his character costume in the film, and eating alone.[14]
After the war, he worked in some continental productions, working with Max Ophüls as the ringmaster in La Ronde (1950) and Ludwig I, King of Bavaria in Lola Montès.[6]
Walbrook retired from feature films in 1958 and moved to Germany, where he worked as a stage and television actor during the 1960s.
Death
edit
In 1967, Walbrook suffered a heart attack on stage while acting in a theatrical production. He survived but later died at the home of actress Hansi Burg in the Garatshausen district of Feldafing, Bavaria, Germany.[1][7][15] His ashes were interred in the churchyard of St. John's Church, Hampstead, London, as he had wished in his will.[16] He is buried with his partner Eugene Edwards, a London florist, although Edwards' name is not on the tombstone.[17]
A biography of Walbrook, penned by James Downs, was published in 2020.[7]
Legacy
editAmerican director Wes Anderson is a great fan of The Red Shoes, and once boasted that he knew all of Walbrook's dialogue in that film by heart.[18] Ralph Fiennes, who played the dandyish hotel concierge Gustave H. in Anderson's film The Grand Budapest Hotel, said that Anderson asked him to study Walbrook's work in The Red Shoes to prepare for his performance.[19] In addition, Gustave's mustache is based on Walbrook's.[20]
Filmography
editTelevision (West Germany)
edit| Year | TV Show | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1960 | Venus Observed | The Duke of Altair | based on Venus Observed |
| 1962 | Laura | Waldo Lydecker | based on Laura |
| 1963 | The Doctor's Dilemma | Sir Colenso Ridgeon | based on The Doctor's Dilemma |
| 1966 | Robert und Elisabeth | (final film role) |
See also
edit
References
editCitations
edit- ^ a b "Walbrook [formerly Wohlbrück], (Adolf Wilhelm) Anton (1896–1967)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/60815. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ "Anton Walbrook – Tomb With a View". Archived from the original on 8 April 2019. Retrieved 3 October 2012.
- ^ Hergemöller, Bernd-Ulrich (2001). Mann für Mann. Suhrkamp. ISBN 9783518397664.
- ^ a b Cross, Brenda (14 February 1948). "Interview with Anton Walbrook". powell-pressburger.org. Retrieved 17 October 2024.
- ^ "Anton Walbrook: Uncovering a Life of Masks and Mirrors by James Downs". www.bdcmuseum.org.uk. Retrieved 17 October 2024.
- ^ a b Berki, Bibi (9 July 2021). "Duality of an Exile: Anton Walbrook, A Life of Masks and Mirrors". FilmInt.nu. Retrieved 17 October 2024.
- ^ a b c d e f Downs, James (25 June 2021). "Masks, Mirrors and Paper trails: Anton Walbrook and the archive". Retrieved 17 October 2024.
- ^ Offermanns, Ernst (2005) (in German). Die deutschen Juden und der Spielfilm der NS-Zeit. Frankfurt: Peter Lang. p. 69.
- ^ David Ehrenstein (20 July 2010). "The Red Shoes: Dancing for Your Life". Current. The Criterion Collection. Retrieved 27 August 2012.
- ^ a b Downs, James (27 April 2021). "The Jewish Actor Accused of Being a Nazi Spy". JewThink. Retrieved 17 October 2024.
- ^ Harper, Sue (October 2023). "James Downs, Anton Walbrook: A Life of Masks and Mirrors". Journal of British Cinema and Television. 20 (4): 520–522. doi:10.3366/jbctv.2023.0690. ISSN 1743-4521.
- ^ The Observer, 29 January 1939, p. 11
- ^ WorldCat entry for Call Me Madam, with details of cast accessed 7 August 2018.
- ^ Commentary track on Criterion DVD of The Red Shoes
- ^ James (9 August 2014). "Anton Walbrook died 47 years ago today". Dark Lane Creative. Retrieved 17 October 2024.
- ^ "Anton Walbrook – the enigmatic actor who is still remembered – Hampstead Parish Church". 31 August 2020.
- ^ Moor, Andrew (31 July 2022). "Book Review: James Downs, Anton Walbrook: A Life of Masks and Mirrors (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2020)". Open Screens. 5 (1). doi:10.16995/OS.9026. ISSN 2516-2888.
- ^ Brody, Richard (25 October 2009). "The Anderson Tapes". The New Yorker. ISSN 0028-792X. Retrieved 17 October 2024.
- ^ Crow, David (5 March 2014). "Grand Budapest Hotel Interview with Ralph Fiennes and Tony Revolori". Den of Geek. Retrieved 17 October 2024.
- ^ "At 'The Grand Budapest,' A Banquet Of Beards And Melange Of Mustaches". NPR. 14 February 2015. Retrieved 17 October 2024.
General sources
edit- Moor, Andrew, Dangerous Limelight: Anton Walbrook and the Seduction of the English (2001)
- Anton Walbrook. A Life of Masks and Mirrors by James Downs (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2020) ISBN 978-1-78997-710-3
External links
edit- Anton Walbrook at IMDb
- Anton Walbrook at the BFI's Screenonline. Biography & filmography
- Photographs of Anton Walbrook