He stud­ied act­ing in Berlin and Vi­enna but there is con­jec­ture about when he left Ger­many prior to World War II. newspaper archive. The cultured, ultra-cool Dr. Georges Bonnet (Anton Diffring) amuses himself with parties to show off his latest artworks, but in reality is desperate for his old partner Professor Ludwig Weiss (Arnold Marlé) to perform an ‘uter-parathyroid’ operation that will give him ten more years of youth and vitality. The surgery is a success, but Vanet is killed after a drunken dance with a bear (or a man in a bear suit!) Description above from the Wikipedia article Anton Diffring, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia. His fa­ther Solomon Pol­lack was a Jew­ish shop-owner who man­aged to avoid in­tern­ment by the Nazi au­thor­i­ties and sur­vived the war. "With the fashion in popular British film-making in the 1950s to make a large number of war films, Diffring suddenly found himself in demand, ironically, like many German émigré actors, playing the very Nazis who forced them out of their homeland," wrote film historian Ian Fryer. Anton Diffring played the Baron, and Don Megowan his creation. His father was a Jewish store-owner, his mother a Christian. In 1969, he changed sides and played a British SAS officer in the Italian film Uccidete Rommel. In the film's most suspenseful scene, Kramer, who as SS colonels go is not too unreasonable, is surprised in the Grand Hall of Schloss Adler by our heroes. Please see our Privacy Notice for details of your data protection rights. Anton Diffring (born Alfred Pollack, 20 October 1916 – 19 May 1989) was a German character actor, who had an extensive acting career in the United Kingdom from the 1940s to the 1980s in cinema films and television. An unnerved Christa goes to her boss, blackmail ring mastermind Mensur (Anton Diffring, THE BLUE MAX, WHERE EAGLES DARE), with her story, and he “recruits” a kidnapped and beaten Sandy for his own operation. But for directors everywhere he remained the "go-to" man for German officers and he accepted his fate. Diffring, Anthony 1915-1989. But while they were both magnificent as commandos on a mission to rescue an American general from a seemingly impregnable fortress in the Bavarian Alps, would the film have been quite as memorable without Diffring's authoritative presence as Waffen-SS Colonel Paul Kramer? Housman), Anna - Eigentlich heiße ich Silvia Seidel. In 1968 Diffring left Britain to go to live in Italy, believing that it would help him get more non-Nazi roles. The Double Man benefits from vivid supporting performances by Clive Revill (as Brynner's possibly unreliable partner), Lloyd Nolan (as a wheelchair-bound CIA executive), Anton Diffring (Brynner's equal in icy disaffection), and Britt Ekland, whose then-husband Peter Sellers (with whom she had just appeared in the failed spoof Casino Royale [1967], also concerned with multiple bogus Bonds) was convinced she … In 1958 he starred as Baron Viktor Frankenstein and in the cult classic The Beast Must Die, released in 1974, he helps his friend, a wealthy big-game hunter, to try to identify a werewolf from a group of invited guests. "The Man who could cheat death" - is a fine lurid Hammer from 1959, with the wonderful Anton Diffring staying young through nefarious surgical procedures, but fast approaching the end of the line when his old partner falls too ill to keep up the gland operation he needs. His first credit in a British film came in 1950, in State Secret. Anton Diffring was a character actor who worked continuously in motion pictures due to his aristocratic face and cool, clipped diction, making him ideal for typecasting in British and later American motion pictures as Nazis and other vile, despicable characters. Diffring paid his co-star Derren Nesbitt, a British actor who played Gestapo officer Major von Hapen, a very generous compliment when he told him while filming Where Eagles Dare, "You're more German than I am" – because when it came to the movies no one was more German than the splendidly sinister Anton Diffring. Anton's real surname was of course Pollack and he was born in Koblenz. Founded in 1934, the company is best known for a series of Gothic horror films made from the mid-1950s until the 1970s. Having trained as an actor in Berlin and Vienna, Anton left his homeland in the late 1930s and went first to the US and then to Canada, where he was interned as an "enemy alien". He moved to France and starred in a number of television series including the historical drama Flambards, for Yorkshire TV. An elaborate game of bluff and double-bluff is played out. Get the latest on Anton Diffring on Fandango. The killer of Corbett’s partner is revealed early on, so it becomes more of an infiltration game as his P.I. Diffring, Antony 1915-1989. He was said to have died of cancer but in 2002 a fellow German actor claimed he died of Aids. It was not the same off-screen. You could say it wasn't really a proper Second World War film if Diffring didn't appear at some point to scare the living daylights out of us. Anton Diffring tysk skuespiller. There was further mystery about the cause of death. The adventures of rugged American spy Jake Webster. Royal SCANDAL: Adolf Hitler’s ‘SECRET WEAPON’ to SEDUCE Prince Edwa... Hitler at Christmas: Bizarre photos show evil Nazi with Santas, Diffring with Sir John Mills in The Colditz Story, Diffring paid his co-star Derren Nesbitt, a British actor who played Gestapo officer Major von Hapen, a very generous compliment when he told him while filming, Anton Diffring had two reasons to flee Germany – he was Jewish and gay, (Image: Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty), His first credit in a British film came in 1950, in, His first main role as a Nazi was in the 1953 prison escape drama, But arguably the most brutal Nazi he played was the chilling Reinhard Heydrich, Reichsprotektor of occupied Bohemia and Moravia in the 1975 film, Promotional poster for the 1968 film Where Eagles Dare, In 1958 he starred as Baron Viktor Frankenstein and in the cult classic, In 1969, he changed sides and played a British SAS officer in the Italian film, He moved to France and starred in a number of television series including the historical drama, In 1983 he played Hitler's foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop in, His final appearance came five years later in, 'Adolf Hitler ESCAPED' Declassified FBI files reveal route, ROYAL BOMBSHELL: Queen Silvia opens up on father’s NAZI secret, Shock as Nazi SECRET TUNNEL discovered yards from Holocaust Memorial. Also appearing in the episode were Lon Chaney Jr. as both the Wolf Man and The Mummy, and Peter Lorre. I did come across a vague reference on a website that Anton had a sister who lived in Essex. That said, he was an intensely private man, who kept himself to himself. Partner Rewards. What was ironic about his typecasting as a Nazi is that Diffring, born in Koblenz, ... Châteauneuf-Grasse, Alpes-Maritimes, France, Drive-In Dust Offs: Circus Of Horrors (1960), The Best Actresses and Actors - Born in the 1910s, Rolling Stone's 30 Best Sports Movies of All Time. Anton Diffring, a German-born actor who portrayed a series of villainous characters that moviegoers loved to hate in more than 50 films and a like number of TV shows, is dead, it was learned Friday. In the 1968 film adaptation, he was portrayed by the late Anton Diffring. 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