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Felix Bressart
Acting
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Felix Bressart (March 2, 1892 – March 17, 1949) was a German-American actor of stage and screen.
Felix Bressart (pronounced "BRESS-ert") was born in East Prussia, Germany (now part of Russia) and was already a very experienced stage actor when he had his film debut in 1928. He started off as a supporting actor, e.g. as the Bailiff in the box-office hit Die Drei von der Tankstelle (1930), but had soon established himself in leading roles of minor movies. After the Nazis seized power in 1933, Jewish-born Bressart had to leave Germany and continued his career in German-speaking movies in Austria, where Jewish artists were still relatively safe. After no …
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Felix Bressart (March 2, 1892 – March 17, 1949) was a German-American actor of stage and screen. Felix Bressart (pronounced "BRESS-ert") was born in East Prussia, Germany (now part of Russia) and was already a very experienced stage actor when he had his film debut in 1928. He started off as a supporting actor, e.g. as the Bailiff in the box-office hit Die Drei von der Tankstelle (1930), but had soon established himself in leading roles of minor movies. After the Nazis seized power in 1933, Jewish-born Bressart had to leave Germany and continued his career in German-speaking movies in Austria, where Jewish artists were still relatively safe. After no fewer than 30 films in eight years, he emigrated to the United States. One of Bressart's former European colleagues was Joe Pasternak, now a successful Hollywood producer. Bressart's first American film was Three Smart Girls Grow Up (1939), a vehicle for Universal Pictures' top attraction, Deanna Durbin. Pasternak also selected the reliable Bressart to perform in a screen test opposite Pasternak's newest discovery, Gloria Jean. The influential German community in Hollywood helped to establish Bressart in America, as his earliest American movies were directed by Ernst Lubitsch, Henry Koster, and Wilhelm Thiele (director of Die Drei von der Tankstelle). Bressart scored a great success in Lubitsch's Ninotchka, produced at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. MGM signed Bressart to a studio contract in 1939. Most of his MGM work consisted of featured roles in major films like Edison, the Man. He combined his mildly inflected East European accent with a soft-spoken delivery to create kindly, friendly characters, as in Lubitsch's To Be or Not to Be, in which he sensitively recites Shylock's famous "Hath not a Jew eyes?" speech from The Merchant of Venice. Lubitsch also directed Bressart to similar effect in The Shop Around the Corner. Bressart soon became a popular character actor in films like Blossoms in the Dust (1941), The Seventh Cross (1944), and Without Love (1945). Perhaps his largest role was in RKO Radio Pictures' "B" musical comedy Ding Dong Williams, filmed in 1945. Bressart, billed third, played the bemused supervisor of a movie studio's music department, and appeared in formal wear to conduct Chopin's "Fantasie Impromptu." After almost 40 Hollywood pictures, Felix Bressart suddenly died of leukemia at the age of 57. His last film was My Friend Irma (1949), the movie version of a popular radio show. Bressart died during production, forcing the producers to finish the film with Hans Conried. In the final film, Conried speaks throughout, but Bressart is still seen in the long shots. Description above from the Wikipedia article Felix Bressart, licensed under CC-BY-SA,full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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BODY OF WORK
Felix Bressart's Filmography
Select any movie to open its full Movies Mates details page.
Take One False Step
as Professor Morris Avrum
Portrait of Jennie
as Pete
A Song Is Born
as Professor Gerkikoff
I've Always Loved You
as Frederick Hassman
Her Sister's Secret
as Pepe
The Thrill of Brazil
as Ludwig Kriegspiel
Ding Dong Williams
as Hugo Meyerheld
Dangerous Partners
as Professor Budlow
Without Love
as Professor Grinza
Blonde Fever
as Johnny
Greenwich Village
as Hofer
The Seventh Cross
as Poldi Schlamm
Song of Russia
as Petrov
Don't Be a Sucker!
as Anti-Nazi Teacher
Above Suspicion
as Mr. A. Werner
Three Hearts for Julia
as Anton Ottoway
Iceland
as Papa Jonsdottir
Crossroads
as Dr. Andre Tessier
To Be or Not to Be
as Greenberg
Mr. and Mrs. North
as Arthur Talbot
Kathleen
as Mr. Schoner
Married Bachelor
as Professor Milic
Blossoms in the Dust
as Dr. Max Breslar
Ziegfeld Girl
as Mischa
Comrade X
as Igor Yahupitz / Vanya
Bitter Sweet
as Max
Escape
as Fritz Keller
Third Finger, Left Hand
as August "Gussie" Winkel
Edison, the Man
as Michael Simon
It All Came True
as The Great Boldini
The Shop Around the Corner
as Pirovitch
Swanee River
as Henry Kleber
Ninotchka
as Comrade Buljanoff
Bridal Suite
as Maxl
Three Smart Girls Grow Up
as Music Teacher
Heut' ist der schönste Tag in meinem Leben
as Max Kaspar
Four and a Half Musketeers
as Professor Volksmann
Everything for the Company
as Philipp Sonndorfer
Ball at the Savoy
as Birowitsch
Peter
as Grandfather
Salto in die Seligkeit
as Kriegel, Geheimdetektiv
No Poster
C'était un musicien
as Baron Vandernyff
No Poster
Wie d'Warret würkt
as Mr. Schramek
...und wer küßt mich?
as Direktor Ritter
The Lucky Top Hat
as Gottfried Jonathan Bankbeamter
Holzapfel Knows Everything
as Johannes Georg Holzapfel
Visul lui Tanase
as star
The Office Manager
as Joachim Reißnagel
Comradeship
as Café Doorman (uncredited)
Excursion into Life
as Hirsekorn - Schauspieler und Chauffeur
Fanfare about love
as Major Fröschen
No More Love
as Jean
Terror of the Garrison
as Musketier Kulicke
True Jacob
as Böcklein
The Private Secretary
as Bankdiener Hasel
No Poster
Eine Freundin so goldig wie Du
as Richard
Three Days in the Guardhouse
as Franz Nowotni
Old Song
as Jacques
The Three from the Filling Station
as Gerichtsvollzieher
The Tender Relatives
as Onkel Emil
No Poster
The fight with the dragon or: The tragedy of the lodger
The Son of the White Mountain
as Jailer
There is a woman who will never forget you
Liebe im Kuhstall
as Der Gerichtsvollzieher