Emil Jannings

Emil Jannings
Born	Theodor Friedrich Emil Janenz (1884-07-23)23 July 1884 Rorschach, Switzerland
Died	2 January 1950(1950-01-02) (aged 65) Strobl, Austria
Cause of death	liver cancer
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1914–1945

Emil Jannings (23 July 1884 – 2 January 1950) was a Swiss-born German/Austrian actor. He was the first person to be presented with an Oscar when he was honored with the first Academy Award for Best Actor, at the 1929 ceremony.

Best known for his collaborations with F. W. Murnau and Josef von Sternberg (including The Blue Angel (1930), with Marlene Dietrich), Jannings later starred in a number of Nazi propaganda films.

Early life

He was christened as Theodor Friedrich Emil Janenz in Rorschach, Switzerland, the son of a Russian-German mother of distant Jewish descent and an American father. While he was still young the family moved to Görlitz in Germany and in the town state theatre Jannings started his stage career. He worked in Bremen and Leipzig before joining the Max Reinhardt theatre company in Berlin.

Career

Jannings as the Devil in Faust

Jannings was a theater actor who went into films. He starred in the 1922 film version of Othello and in F. W. Murnau's The Last Laugh (Der Letzte Mann, 1924), as a proud but aged hotel doorman who is demoted to a restroom attendant. Jannings worked with Murnau on two other films, playing the title character in Herr Tartüff (1925) and Mephistopheles in Faust (1926). Jannings eventually started a career in Hollywood. In 1929 he won the first Best Actor Oscar for his work in two films: The Way of All Flesh (now lost), and Josef von Sternberg's The Last Command.

His Hollywood career came to an end with the advent of talkies as his thick German accent was difficult to understand. His dialogue was initially dubbed by another actor in the part-talkie The Patriot (1928), although Jannings' own voice was restored after he objected. Returning to Europe, he starred opposite Marlene Dietrich in the 1930 film The Blue Angel, which was filmed simultaneously in English with its German version Der blaue Engel.

According to Susan Orlean, author of Rin Tin Tin: The Life and The Legend (Simon and Schuster, 2011), Jannings was not actually the winner of the first best actor vote, but the runner-up. While researching her book, Orlean discovered that it was in fact Rin Tin Tin, the German Shepherd dog, one of the biggest movie stars of his time, who won the vote. The Academy, however, worried about being taken seriously if they gave the first Oscar to a dog, chose to award the Oscar to the human runner-up.

Later life

With Joseph Goebbels in 1938

During the Third Reich, he starred in several films which were intended to promote Nazism, particularly the Führerprinzip: The Youth of Frederick the Great (1935), Der Herrscher ("The Ruler" 1937), Ohm Kruger (Uncle Kruger, 1941) and The Dismissal of Bismarck (1942). Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels named him "Artist of the State" in 1941.^{[citation needed]}

When troops of the Allied Powers entered Germany in 1945, Jannings reportedly carried his Oscar statuette with him as proof of his former association with Hollywood. His active role in Nazi propaganda meant that he was subject to denazification, and no comeback attempt was possible. He retired near Salzburg, Austria, and became an Austrian citizen in 1947.

Marriages

Jannings was married three times. All three marriages were to stage and film actresses and all three ended in divorce. His first marriage was to Hanna Ralph, his second to Lucie Höflich and his final marriage was to Gussy Holl, who had been previously married to actor Conrad Veidt.

Death

Jannings died in 1950, aged 65, in Strobl, from liver cancer. His Best Actor Oscar is now on display at the Berlin Filmmuseum.

Cultural depictions

Hilmar Eichhorn portrayed a fictional version of Jannings in Inglourious Basterds, directed by Quentin Tarantino.

Filmography

Year	Film	Role	Notes
1914	Arme Eva
	Im Schützengraben
	Passionels Tagebuch
1916	Aus Mangel an Beweisen	Dr. Langer
	Die Bettlerin von St. Marien	Baron Gelsburg
	Frau Eva
	Im Angesicht des Toten	Paul Werner
	Life Is a Dream
	Nächte des Grauens
	Stein unter Steinen
1917	Das Fidele Gefängnis	Quabbe, the jailer	The Merry Jail (Europe: English title)
	When Four Do the Same	Segetoff
	Hoheit Radieschen
	The Marriage of Luise Rohrbach	Wilhelm Rohrbach
	Der Zehnte Pavillon der Zitadelle
	Das Geschäft	S. H. Haßler
	Lulu
	Der Ring der Giuditta Foscari
	Die Seeschlacht
	Unheilbar
1918	Keimendes Leben, Teil 1	James Fraenkel, Börsenmarktler John Smith, amerikanischer Ingenieur
	Die Augen der Mumie Ma	Radu, an Arab	aka The Eyes of the Mummy
	Fuhrmann Henschel
	Nach zwanzig Jahren	Horst Lundin 'Korn'
1919	Rose Bernd	Arthur Streckmann
	Madame DuBarry	Louis XV	aka Passion
	Vendetta	Tomasso
	Die Tochter des Mehemed	Vaco Juan Riberda, Fabrikbesitzer
	Keimendes Leben, Teil 2
	Der Mann der Tat	Jan Miller
1920	Colombine
	Anna Boleyn	Henry VIII	aka Deception
	Der Schädel der Pharaonentochter	Osorcon, Pharao of Egypt
	Algol - Tragödie der Macht	Robert Herne
	Das Große Licht	Lorenz Ferleitner
	Kohlhiesels Töchter	Peter Xaver	aka Kohlhiesel's Daughters
1921	Die Ratten	Bruno
	Der Schwur des Peter Hergatz
	Danton	Danton	aka All for a Woman
	Der Stier von Olivera	General François Guillaume
	Die Brüder Karamasoff	Dimitri Karamasoff	aka The Brothers Karamazov
1922	Peter der Große	Peter der Große	aka Peter the Great (USA)
	Othello	Othello
	Das Weib des Pharao	Pharao Amenes	aka Loves of the Pharaoh
	Die Gräfin von Paris		aka The Countess of Paris (USA)
1923	Alles für Geld	S. I. Rupp
	Tragödie der Liebe	Ombrade	aka The Tragedy of Love (USA)
1924	Der Letzte Mann	Hotelportier (hotel porter)	The Last Laugh (USA)
	Nju - Eine unverstandene Frau	Ehemann	aka Husbands or Lovers (USA)
	Das Wachsfigurenkabinett	Harun al Raschid	aka Waxworks
1925	Varieté	Boss Huller	aka Jealousy (USA)
	Quo Vadis?	Nerone	Extant
	Liebe macht blind	Emil Jannings	aka Love Makes Us Blind
1926	Herr Tartüff	Tartüff
	Faust - Eine deutsche Volkssage	Mephisto	Extant
1927	The Way of All Flesh	August Schilling	Academy Award for Best Actor; Lost film
1928	Sins of the Fathers	Wilhelm Spengler	excerpts and clips are preserved of this film. Unconfirmed about the total film
	The Patriot	Czar Paul I	Lost film
	Street of Sin	Basher Bill	Lost film
	The Last Command	Gen. Dolgorucki / Grand Duke Sergius Alexander	Academy Award for Best Actor; Extant
1929	Betrayal	Poldi Moser
	Fighting the White Slave Traffic
1930	Darling of the Gods	Albert Winkelmann	aka Darling of the Gods
	Der blaue Engel	Prof. Immanuel Rath	aka The Blue Angel (USA)
1932	Stürme der Leidenschaft	Gustav Bumke	aka Storms of Passion aka Tempest
1933	Die Abenteuer des Königs Pausole	King Pausole	aka The Adventures of King Pausole
	The Merry Monarch	King Pausole
1934	Der Schwarze Walfisch	Peter Petersen	aka The Black Whale (International: English title)
1935	Der Alte und der junge König - Friedrichs des Grossen Jugend	Friedrich Wilhelm I. König von Preussen	aka The Making of a King (USA)
1936	Traumulus	Direktor Prof. Niemeyer	aka The Dreamer
1937	Der Zerbrochene Krug	Adam, Dorfrichter	aka The Broken Jug
	Der Herrscher	Matthias Clausen	aka The Ruler
1939	Robert Koch, der Bekämpfer des Todes	Dr. Robert Koch
	Der Trichter. (Nr. III)		scenes deleted
1941	Ohm Krüger	Ohm Krüger	aka Uncle Kruger (International: English title)
1942	Die Entlassung	Bismarck	aka Bismarck's Dismissal (UK)
1943	Altes Herz wird wieder jung	Fabrikdirektor Hoffmann
1945	Wo ist Herr Belling?	Firmenchef Eberhard Belling	aka Where Is Mr. Belling?

See also

• List of German-speaking Academy Award winners and nominees

Further reading

• Frank Noack: Jannings. Belleville, München 2009 ISBN 978-3-933510-50-1
• Carl Zuckmayer: Geheimreport. Hrsg. von Gunther Nickel und Johanna Schrön. Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen 2002, ISBN 3-89244-599-0; pp. 136–45
• Emil Jannings: Theater, Film - Das Leben und ich. Autobiographie. Berchtesgaden: Verlag Zimmer & Herzog, 1951. (posthumous)
• Herbert Ihering: Emil Jannings: Baumeister seines Lebens und seiner Filme. Heidelberg 1941

External links

• Emil Jannings at Find a Grave
• Emil Jannings at the Internet Movie Database
• Photographs of Emil Jannings