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German actor (1862–1943) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Gustav von Seyffertitz (4 August 1862 – 25 December 1943) was a German film actor and director. He settled in the United States. He was born in Haimhausen, Bavaria, and died in Los Angeles, California, aged 81.
Gustav von Seyffertitz | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Seyffertitz in 1922 | |
| Born | Gustav Carl Viktor Bodo Maria von Seyffertitz 4 August 1862 |
| Died | 25 December 1943 (aged 81) Los Angeles, California, United States |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | ca. 1880–1939 |
| Spouse(s) | Katharina Hoffmann (1886) Toni Creutzburg (1894) Frieda Eugenie von Mink Nelly Thorne[1] |
| Children | Wilhelm (1882) Joan Goodridge |
Gustav von Seyffertitz was born into an aristocratic family as the son of Guido Freiherr von Seyffertitz and his wife Anna Gräfin von Butler Clonebough zu Haimhausen. His family expected him to start a military career, but was shocked when he said that he wanted to be an actor. He was a member of the Meiningen Court Theatre and also appeared in operas. He emigrated to the United States in 1896, after being asked by the Austrian-American theatre director Heinrich Conried. Despite his thick German accent, he was successful on Broadway where he worked as a stage actor and director during the 1900s and 1910s. He appeared as an actor in such lavish productions as The Brass Bottle in 1910. This play was turned into several films and was the idea for the television show I Dream of Jeannie in the 1960s.[2] He made his film debut in 1917, appearing with Douglas Fairbanks in Down to Earth.
In his films, the dignified-looking Seyffertitz often played the "very embodiment of the Hideous Hun - America's notion of the merciless, atrocity-happy German military officer".[3] One of his most successful film roles was Professor Moriarty in 1922's Sherlock Holmes with John Barrymore. He also played the antagonist to Mary Pickford in Sparrows (1926) and appeared as Ramon Novarro's uncle, the king of a small German state, in Ernst Lubitsch's The Student Prince in Old Heidelberg (1927). He continued his career into the sound film and portrayed supporting roles in the Josef von Sternberg-Marlene Dietrich films Dishonored (1931) and Shanghai Express (1932). Among his later film roles was a parody on Sigmund Freud in Frank Capra's film classic Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936). He appeared in 118 films between 1917 and 1939.
Seyffertitz was married five times and had numerous children.[4]
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