Felix Bressart (March 2, 1895 – March 17, 1949) was a German-born actor of stage and screen whose career spanned both Europe and Hollywood.
Contents
Early days
Bressart (pronounced "BRESS-ert") was born in Eydtkuhnen, East Prussia, Germany (now in Nesterovsky District, Russia).
Career
Bressart’s acting debut came in 1914 as Malvolio in Twelfth Night and he went on to act in Austria, Denmark, England, France, Germany, Hungary, and Yugoslavia. He was an experienced stage actor when he had his film debut in 1927. He began as a supporting actor, for example as the bailiff in the boxoffice hit Die Drei von der Tankstelle (The Three from the Filling Station), but soon established himself in leading roles of minor movies. After the Nazis seized power in 1933, the Jewish Bressart left Germany and continued his career in German-speaking movies in Austria, where Jewish artists were still relatively safe. After acting in 40 German films, he immigrated to the United States in 1936.
One of Bressart's former European colleagues was Joe Pasternak, who had become a successful producer at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Bressart's first American film was Three Smart Girls Grow Up (1939), a vehicle for the Universal Pictures' star, Deanna Durbin. Pasternak chose Bressart to perform in a screen test opposite Pasternak's newest discovery, Gloria Jean. The 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 (who had directed Bressart in The Three from the Filling Station).
