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 F i l m P e o p l e L - O
Austrian, German and Swiss Film People in Hollywood (Part 4 - L-O)
Also see > An Introduction to how these people are selected
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Carl Laemmle (1867-1939)
German founder of Universal Studios and creator of Universal City studio complex in California's San Fernando Valley (1915). His son, Carl, Jr., was responsible for producing the film classics All Quiet on the Western Front, Dracula and Frankenstein.
Hedy Lamarr (Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler, 1913-2000)
Austrian actress (Ziegfield Girl, Samson and Delilah). Satirized in Mel Brooks' classic Blazing Saddles (1973) as the villainous “Hedley Lamarr” (Harvey Korman), Lamarr was more than just “the most beautiful girl in the world” (L.B. Mayer) – she has a WWII patent to her credit! More on our Hedy Lamarr page.
Fritz Lang (1890-1976)
Austrian director of Metropolis, Ministry of Fear, The Big Heat and Fury.
Henry (Pathé) Lehrman (1886-1946)
Vienna-born Austrian actor, director and screenwriter who worked for Mack Sennet at Keystone and directed the first four Charlie Chaplin films. Lehrman came to the US in 1905. His nickname arose from his tale of passing himself off as a representative of the French Pathé film company in order to get into the film business.
Paul Leni (1885-1929)
German director, art director. Although Leni died unexpectedly only two years after his arrival in Hollywood in 1927, his legacy included visual techniques that are still seen in horor-suspense films today. After gaining vast experience during the heyday of German silent films, Leni accepted an invitation from Carl Laemmle to come to Hollywood, where he made only four films. The Cat and the Canary (1927) displayed Leni's keen sense for style, mood, and effects, and became a precursor for Universal's series of horror films in the 1930s. In Germany, Leni's notable work included the horror classic Das Wachsfigurenkabinett (Waxworks, 1924).
Lotte Lenya (Karoline Blamauer, 1900-1981)
Austrian actress. Lenya is perhaps best remembered for one of her later film roles - as the nasty Russian villainess in the 1963 James Bond film From Russia With Love. Born in Hitzing, Austria, Lenya sang her way to fame in Brecht-Weill musical productions in Berlin, the best-known being “Die Dreigroschenoper” (“The Threepenny Opera”), including G.W. Pabst's 1931 film version. Lenya married the composer Kurt Weill (1900-1950) and with him fled the Nazis to New York City (where Weill composed three Broadway musicals). After his death she resumed her stage career, appearing in productions such as “Cabaret.” Her other films: The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone (1961), The Appointment (1969), and Semi-Tough (1977).
Karl Walter Lindenlaub (1957- )
German cinematographer (b. 19 June 1957, Bremen) who worked with German director Roland Emmerich on Universal Soldier (1992), Stargate (1994) and Independence Day (1996). His other camera work includes Rob Roy (1995), Red Corner (1997), The Princess Diaries (2001), and Maid in Manhattan (2002).
Marcus Loew (1870-1927)
Founder of MGM studios and the Loew's theater chain. Loew was born to Austrian immigrant parents in New York City.
Frederick Loewe (1901-1988)
Austrian composer and member of the famous Lerner and Loewe team (after 1942). His collaboration with Alan Jay Lerner produced Tony and Oscar-winning musicals such as "Gigi" and "My Fair Lady."
Peter Lorre (Laszlo Löwenstein, 1904-1964)
Austrian actor (The Maltese Falcon, Casablanca, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea)
Ernst Lubitsch (1892-1947)
German-American director, producer who received a special Oscar in 1947 for his “25-year contribution to motion pictures.” Lubitsch's unique directing style became famous as “the Lubitsch Touch” and he served as an inspiration for other directors, including Orson Welles and Billy Wilder. Born in Berlin, Lubitsch had already won respect for his work in Germany when Mary Pickford asked him to come to Hollywood (1922). There he refined his “touch” on films such as Design for Living (1933), Bluebeard's Eighth Wife (1938), Ninotchka (1939, with Greta Garbo), The Shop Around the Corner (1940, remade by Nora Ephron as You've Got Mail in 1998), and Heaven Can Wait (1943).
Paul Leni (1885-1929)
German director, art director. Although Leni died unexpectedly only two years after his arrival in Hollywood in 1927, his legacy included visual techniques that are still seen in horor-suspense films today. After gaining vast experience during the heyday of German silent films, Leni accepted an invitation from Carl Laemmle to come to Hollywood, where he made only four films. The Cat and the Canary (1927) displayed Leni's keen sense for style, mood, and effects, and became a precursor for Universal's series of horror films in the 1930s. In Germany, Leni's notable work included the horror classic Das Wachsfigurenkabinett (Waxworks, 1924).
Lotte Lenya (Karoline Blamauer, 1900-1981)
Austrian actress. Lenya is perhaps best remembered for one of her later film roles – as the nasty Russian villainess in the 1963 James Bond film From Russia With Love. Born in Hitzing, Austria, Lenya sang her way to fame in Brecht-Weill musical productions in Berlin, the best-known being Die Dreigroschenoper (“The Threepenny Opera”), including G.W. Pabst's 1931 film version. Lenya married the composer Kurt Weill (1900-1950) and with him fled the Nazis to New York City (where Weill composed three Broadway musicals). After his death she resumed her stage career, appearing in productions such as “Cabaret.” Her other films: The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone (1961), The Appointment (1969), and Semi-Tough (1977).
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Anthony Mann (Emil Anton Bundmann, 1906-1967)
German-American director. (Sullivan's Travels, Border Incident, Winchester '73, The Glenn Miller Story, God's Little Acre, El Cid)
June Marlowe (Gisela Valaria Goetten, 1903-1984)
Austrian-American actress born in St. Cloud, Minnesota. June's (Gisela's) mother, Hedwig “Hattie” Himsl, was born in Haslach, Austria. Marlowe's family later moved to Los Angeles. She made her first film in 1923, going on to make many silent features for Warner Brothers and Universal. She appeared in several 1925/1926 Rin-Tin-Tin features (Below the Lines, Clash of the Wolves, The Night Cry and The Lone Defender) and played Miss Crabtree in the Little Rascals series. In 1929 Universal sent the German-speaking actress to Berlin to make several German silent films (House of Glass, Die seltsame Vergangenheit der Thea Carter and Durch Brandenburger Tor). Marlowe also appeared briefly in a Laurel and Hardy comedy (Pardon Us, 1931). She made her last film in 1932 (Devil on Deck).
WEB LINK > June Marlowe - A nice fan site (JuneSite) by Don Spears.
Rudolph "Rudy" Maté (Rudolf Matheh, 1898-1964)
Austrian director and cameraman born in Cracow (Krakau) in what was then Austria-Hungary (now Poland). Maté had a very international early career in Budapest, Berlin, Vienna, and Paris before he was invited to work as a cameraman for Fox in Hollywood in 1934. Among many others, he was behind the lens on Foreign Correspondent (1940) for Hitchcock, That Hamilton Woman (1941) for Alexander Korda, with whom he had worked earlier in Europe, and To Be or Not to Be (1942) for Ernst Lubitsch. Some of his first work as a director included classic film noir productions such as Dark Past (1948), D.O.A. (1950), and Union Station (1950). Maté went on to direct a series of respectable films, including When Worlds Collide (1951) and The Black Shield of Falworth (1954), but his reputation stands largely on his Academy Award-nominated cinematography (five films) and his early film noir work as a director. Maté died of a heart attack in Hollywood in 1964.
Victor Mature (1915- )
American actor born to Swiss parents in Louisville, Kentucky. His films include: No No Nanette, My Darling Clementine, Samson and Delilah, The Robe, The Egyptian, Demetrius and the Gladiator, and a few classic noir films.
Joe May (Julius Otto Mandl, 1880-1954)
Austrian producer, director. A number of Germans and Austrians, including director Fritz Lang, began their film careers working for May in Germany, where he had established his own film production company in 1914. With the advent of the Third Reich, May went to Hollywood in 1933 where he directed House of Fear (1939), The Invisible Man Returns, The House of Seven Gables (both 1940) and several other movies.
Mike Mazurki (Michail, 1909-1990)
Austrian-American actor whose distinctive mug appeared in hundreds of Hollywood movies from 1934 to 1990. Mazurki played mostly bit parts as a coolie, gangster, or loveable lug. He appeared in both the 1945 and 1990 versions of Dick Tracy. Mazurki came to the US at the age of six. His first film appearance was as an extra in the 1934 Mae West film Belle of the Nineties. Roles in many other films followed, including: Mr. Moto's Gamble (1938), Abbott and Costello in Hollywood (1945), Rope of Sand (with Peter Lorre, 1949), Blood Alley (1955, with John Wayne and Lauren Bacall), Around the World in 80 Days (1956), Billy Wilder's Some Like It Hot (1959), Five Weeks in a Balloon (1962), Deliverance (1972), and Amazon Women on the Moon (1987). Mazurki was also seen in many television productions between 1954 and 1983, including such classics as Disney, “Adam-12,” “Have Gun - Will Travel,” “Gilligan's Island,” and “Fantasy Island.”
WEB LINK > More about Mazurki from the Hollywood Archaeology Web site (with photos).
Paul Muni (Meier "Muni" Weisenfreund, 1895-1967)
Austrian-American actor. Born in what was then Lemberg, Austria (now Lviv, Ukraine), Muni grew up in a German-speaking Jewish family of itinerant actors who made appearances across the eastern regions of the Austro-Hungarian empire. > MORE
F.W. Murnau (1888-1931)
German director of Nosferatu (1922, the first Dracula movie) and Tabu (U.S., 1931). Murnau's silent (with some sound added) Sunrise (1927) won Academy Awards for Best Film, Best Actress (Janet Gaynor), and cinematography (Karl Struss and Charles Rosher). His US career was tragically cut short at the age of 42 by his death in an auto accident in California. He is buried in the Stahnsdorf cemetery near Berlin and the Ufa film studios where his directing career began. A highly fictionalized account of Murnau's making of Nosferatu was seen in Shadow of the Vampire (2001).
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Kurt Neumann (1902-1984)
Neumann was born in Judendorf, Austria. In the US the writer/producer went by the name Walter Traun. Films: Hostages, Above Suspicion, Action in the North Atlantic and Hangmen Also Die (all 1943), The Hitler Gang (1944) and Counter Attack (1945).
Kurt Neumann (1906-1958)
Born in Nuremberg, Germany, Neumann directed and produced one of the all-time classic sci-fi films: The Fly (1958). He also directed four of the Tarzan films and many low-budget films of the 1930s and '40s. Some of his films: The Big Cage (1933), Espionage (1937), Rocketship X-M (1950), Reunion in Reno (1951), Hiawatha (1952), The Deerslayer (1957), Kronos (1957), Watusi (1959).
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Max Ophüls (Maximilian Oppenheimer, 1902-1957)
German director, screenwriter. Also known as “Ophuls” or “Opuls” in the US, Ophüls went through the familiar Nazi-forced exile, but his was more nomadic than most. He was born in Saarbrucken, but before landing in Hollywood in 1941, he had worked in France, Holland, Italy, Russia, and Switzerland. After directing several French films in the early 1950s, Ophüls returned to Germany in 1956 to direct a stage play in Hamburg, where he died of a heart condition two months after the play had opened. His four Hollywood films: The Exile (1947), Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948, his best US film), Caught (1949) and The Reckless Moment (1949). Ophüls was fired by Howard Hughes after only a few days of directing Vendetta (1946), but the film was botched by several successors and was a box-office failure. - See our Film Festivals Page for more about the Max Ophüls Film Prize Festival in Saarbrucken, Germany each January.
Richard Oswald (Richard Ornstein, 1880-1963)
Austrian director, producer. Born in Vienna, Oswald became one of Germany's most prolific film directors in Babelsberg (near Berlin). He founded his own film production company in 1916 (Oswald-Film) and produced an incredible number of successful silent films. In the process he became the “discoverer” of many film people, some later to become famous in Hollywood, including Lya De Putti, Conrad Veidt and William (Wilhelm) Dieterle.
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