Felix Bressart
Date of birth: 1892-03-02
Place of birth: Eydtkuhnen, East Prussia, Germany [now Chernyshevskoe, Russia]
Known for: Acting
Also known as: Феликс Брессарт
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 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.
Movie Credits
To Be or Not to Be
1942-03-06
During the Nazi occupation of Poland, an acting troupe becomes embroiled in a Polish soldier's effor
The Three from the Filling Station
1930-09-15
Die Drei von der Tankstelle, meaning The Three from the Gas Station, was advertised as a German oper
The fight with the dragon or: The tragedy of the lodger
1930-08-13
A meek clerk can no longer abide the nastiness of his boarding house proprietress and takes drastic
Ninotchka
1939-11-23
A stern Russian woman sent to Paris on official business finds herself attracted to a man who repres
The Shop Around the Corner
1940-01-12
Two employees at a gift shop can barely stand one another, without realising that they are falling i
Take One False Step
1949-08-14
Catherine Sykes disappears after a midnight drive with Professor Andrew Gentling . When she's presum
Comrade X
1940-12-13
An American reporter smuggling news out of Soviet Moscow is blackmailed into helping a beautiful Com
Above Suspicion
1943-05-31
Two newlyweds spy on the Nazis for the British Secret Service during their honeymoon in Europe.
Crossroads
1942-07-23
A French diplomat who's recovered from amnesia is blackmailed over crimes he can't remember.
Edison, the Man
1940-05-10
In flashback, fifty years after inventing the light bulb, an 82-year-old Edison tells his story star
It All Came True
1940-04-06
After crooked nightclub owner murders a police informant, he blackmails his piano player to allow hi
Third Finger, Left Hand
1940-10-11
Magazine editor Margot Merrick pretends to be married in order to avoid advances from male colleague
Blossoms in the Dust
1941-08-15
Edna marries Texan Sam Gladney, operator of a wheat mill. They have a son, who is killed when very y
The Seventh Cross
1944-07-24
In Nazi Germany in 1936 seven men escape from a concentration camp. The camp commander puts up seven
Escape
1940-11-01
An American goes to pre-war Germany to find his mother and discovers her in a concentration camp. Wi
Dangerous Partners
1945-06-07
A young couple's accident could make them rich, if they can evade a Nazi spy ring.
Blonde Fever
1944-12-05
Peter and Delilah are a married couple running a roadside café in Nevada. Their stable partnership t
Swanee River
1939-12-29
Swanee River is a 1940 American biopic about Stephen Foster, a songwriter from Pittsburgh who falls
I've Always Loved You
1946-12-02
A beautiful young concert pianist is torn between her attraction to her arrogant but brilliant maest
Peter
1934-12-19
Starring Francisca Gaál in a breeches role. Dressed as a boy, a street musician gets a job pumping g
Wie d'Warret würkt
1933-12-01
The story revolves around the confusion that arises when a supposed gold discovery in Valais divides
Bitter Sweet
1940-11-08
A woman runs away with her music teacher in order to escape an arranged marriage, but they struggle
Married Bachelor
1941-10-16
A man's marriage suffers when he pretends to be a bachelor while promoting "his" best-selling book a
Bridal Suite
1939-05-26
A carefree playboy with an aversion to marriage falls for a lass he meets in the French Alps.
No More Love
1931-07-26
An American millionaire, who had always bad luck with women, bets that he can live without them for
Terror of the Garrison
1931-04-23
The Lucky Top Hat
1932-08-18
Gottfried Jonathan, a small civil servant, lives as a lodger and is roommates with the blonde Käthe.
The Office Manager
1931-11-19
Ding Dong Williams
1946-04-15
Ding Dong Williams, a clarinet player who can neither read nor write music is employed at a motion p
Eine Freundin so goldig wie Du
1930-12-15
The lively Anny meets the nice Dr. Jack Braun and throws everything in his life into disarray. As Ja
The Tender Relatives
1930-08-28
Three Hearts for Julia
1943-05-21
When his wife threatens him with divorce, a reporter courts her again.
Excursion into Life
1931-09-30
Felix Bressart, later one of the most delightful members of the Ernst Lubitsch "stock company," play
Ziegfeld Girl
1941-04-25
Discovery by Flo Ziegfeld changes a girl's life but not necessarily for the better, as three beautif
Her Sister's Secret
1946-09-23
A WWII tale of romance that begins during New Orlean's "Mardi Gras" celebration when a soldier and a
There is a woman who will never forget you
1930-03-27
Fanfare about love
1931-09-03
Caught by Archduke Max in an embarrassing situation with Marie-Charlote, Captain Rudi is forced into
Everything for the Company
1935-04-04
Familial disputes surrounding a traditional business. Grandfather Sonndorfer allies himself with his
Kathleen
1941-12-18
Kathleen is a twelve-year-old who lives in a big house with a nanny, a butler, maids, no mother and
Three Smart Girls Grow Up
1939-03-24
Three sisters who believe life is going to be easy, now that their parents are back together, until
Three Days in the Guardhouse
1930-11-10
When an attractive maid in a garrison town becomes pregnant, she reveals that one of three soldiers
Heut' ist der schönste Tag in meinem Leben
1936-05-21
Two twin brothers working in a Vienna fair and who are both gifted for singing meet different luck b
Liebe im Kuhstall
1928-10-19
An impoverished nobleman would rather chase after the local milkmaid than seek a wealthy match, to t
The Private Secretary
1931-01-16
During hard times, a vivacious girl looks for an office job in the hope of landing a rich man. The d
True Jacob
1931-03-16
Song of Russia
1944-02-10
American conductor John Meredith and his manager, Hank Higgins, go to Russia shortly before the Nazi
Greenwich Village
1944-09-27
In 1922, a would-be classical composer gets involved with people putting on a musical revue.
Don't Be a Sucker!
1943-07-04
Propaganda short film depicting the rise of Nazism in Germany and how political propaganda is simila
The Thrill of Brazil
1946-09-06
Steve, revue producer in Rio de Janeiro, is still in love with his ex-wife Vicki, his star Linda is
...und wer küßt mich?
1933-03-07
Without Love
1945-03-22
In World War II Washington DC, scientist Pat Jamieson's assistant, Jamie Rowan, enters a loveless ma
Iceland
1942-09-21
Marine James Murfin, is unaware of Icelandic customs. When he flirts with Katina her Icelandic famil
Salto in die Seligkeit
1934-10-31
An unemployed artist must choose between a flower seller and a Hungarian dancer and defend himself a
A Song Is Born
1948-10-19
The story of seven scholars in search of an expert to teach them about swing music. They seem to hav
Old Song
1930-10-15
Portrait of Jennie
1948-12-25
A mysterious girl inspires a struggling artist.
C'était un musicien
1934-05-11
When he is not conducting his orchestra, a talented young man invents a device to thwart car thieves
Holzapfel Knows Everything
1932-02-05
An unemployed man who plays a concertina gets involved with a band of crooks and tries to frustrate
Visul lui Tanase
1932-01-01
Cinematic sketches of Tanase's adventures in Berlin, where he was invited to star in the movie. A Ro
Ball at the Savoy
1935-04-11
Operetta star Gitta Alpar plays a singer engaged for a performance at the Savoy Hotel, where she mis
Four and a Half Musketeers
1935-10-01
A Hungarian-Austrian comedy and one of the last emigrant films made in Austria before the industry s
Mr. and Mrs. North
1942-01-23
Married sleuths (Gracie Allen, William Post Jr.) find a corpse in their closet and round up suspects
Comradeship
1931-11-17
At a mine on the shared edge of France and Germany, an underground explosion leads to the entrapment