Birthday: 1890-04-18
Deathday: 1945-03-14
Birthplace: Werbowitz, Galicia, Austria-Hungary [now Verbivtsi, Kolomyia Raion, Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast, Ukraine]
Gender: Male
Owned By: Unowned
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Alexander Granach (April 18, 1890 – March 14, 1945) was a popular German actor in the 1920s and 1930s who immigrated to the United States in 1938.
Granach was born Jessaja Gronach in Werbowitz (Wierzbowce/Werbiwci) (Horodenka district, Austrian Galicia then, now Verbivtsi, Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast, Ukraine), to Jewish parents and rose to theatrical prominence at the Volksbühne in Berlin. Granach entered films in 1922; among the most widely exhibited of his silent efforts was the vampire classic Nosferatu (1922), in which the actor was cast as Knock, the lunatic counterpart to Renfield, effectively a substitute name for Dracula. He co-starred in such major early German talkies as Kameradschaft (1931).
The Jewish Granach fled to the Soviet Union when Hitler came to power. When the Soviet Union also proved inhospitable, he settled in Hollywood, where he made his first American film appearance as Kopalski in Ernst Lubitsch's Ninotchka (1939) for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Granach proved indispensable to film makers during the war years, effectively portraying both dedicated Nazis (he was Julius Streicher in The Hitler Gang, 1944) and loyal anti-fascists. Perhaps his best role was as Gestapo Inspector Alois Gruber in Fritz Lang's Hangmen Also Die! (1943). His last film appearance was in MGM's The Seventh Cross (1944), in which almost the entire supporting cast was prominent European refugees.
Year | Title | Character | |
---|---|---|---|
1998-03-15 | Nosferatu: The First Vampire | Knock - ein Häusermakler | |
1944-10-12 | My Buddy | Tim Oberta | |
1944-07-24 | The Seventh Cross | Zillich | |
1944-03-03 | Voice in the Wind | Angelo | |
1943-12-30 | Three Russian Girls | Major Braginski | |
1943-07-12 | For Whom the Bell Tolls | Paco | |
1943-04-29 | Mission to Moscow | Russian Air Force Officer (uncredited) | |
1943-04-15 | Hangmen Also Die! | Gestapo Insp. Alois Gruber | |
1942-11-07 | Wrecking Crew | Joe Poska | |
1942-10-28 | Northwest Rangers | Pierre - Man in Casino | |
1942-09-18 | Half Way to Shanghai | Mr. Nikolas | |
1942-01-20 | Joan of Paris | Gestapo Agent | |
1941-03-07 | A Man Betrayed | T. Amato | |
1941-02-27 | So Ends Our Night | The Pole | |
1940-08-16 | Foreign Correspondent | Hotel Valet (uncredited) | |
1939-12-29 | The Hunchback of Notre Dame | Soldier (uncredited) | |
1939-11-23 | Ninotchka | Comrade Kopalski | |
1936-09-10 | Der Kampf | Rovelli | |
1936-07-29 | Gypsies | Danilo | |
1931-12-31 | A Man's a Man | ||
1931-11-17 | Comradeship | Kasper | |
1931-08-24 | The Theft of the Mona Lisa | Redner | |
1931-01-21 | Danton | Marat | |
1931-01-20 | 1914 | Jaurès' Friend | |
1930-05-16 | The Twelfth Hour | Karsten | |
1929-07-08 | Das letzte Fort | Gestino | |
1929-06-29 | Flucht in die Fremdenlegion | Beppo, Legionär | |
1929-04-09 | Pavement Butterfly | Coco | |
1929-02-12 | The Adjutant of the Czar | Stranger | |
1928-12-07 | Freie Fahrt | ||
1928-11-06 | Accident | ||
1928-01-19 | Ich hatte einst ein schönes Vaterland | Pollaczek | |
1927-10-29 | Die berühmte Frau | Diener bei Alfredo | |
1927-09-06 | Svengali | Geiger Gecko | |
1926-04-23 | Qualen der Nacht | Murphy | |
1924-03-05 | Die Radio Heirat | ||
1923-12-24 | I.N.R.I. – A Film of Humanity | Judas Ischariot | |
1923-11-01 | Ein Weib, ein Tier, ein Diamant | Archivar Lindhorst | |
1923-10-16 | Warning Shadows | Shadowplayer | |
1923-06-11 | Man by the Roadside | Shoemaker | |
1923-04-02 | Navarro the Dancer | Clegg | |
1923-03-31 | Paganini | Ferucchio | |
1923-02-22 | Earth Spirit | Schigolch | |
1922-10-20 | Lucrezia Borgia | ein Gefangener | |
1922-02-16 | Nosferatu | Knock | |
1921-04-23 | Camera obscura |