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IMDbPro

Paul Henreid(1908-1992)

  • Director
  • Actor
  • Producer
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Paul Henreid
After marrying her long lost love, a musician finds the relationship threatened by a wealthy composer who is besotted with her.
Play trailer2:27
Deception (1946)
9 Videos
99+ Photos
Paul Henreid was born Paul Georg Julius Freiherr von Hernreid Ritter von Wasel-Waldingau in Trieste, in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He was the son of Marie Luise Heilig (Lendecke) and Baron Karl Alphons Hernreid. His father was an aristocratic banker, who was born to a Jewish family whose surname was changed from Hirsch to Hernreid.

Paul grew up in Vienna and studied at the prestigious Maria Theresa Academy (graduating in 1927) and the Institute of Graphic Arts. For four years, he worked as translator and book designer for a publishing outfit run by Otto Preminger, while training to be an actor at night. Preminger was also a protégé (and managing director) of Max Reinhardt. After attending one of Henreid's acting school performances, Preminger introduced him to the famous stage director and this led to a contract. In 1933, Paul made his debut at the Reinhardt Theatre in "Faust". He subsequently had several leading roles on the stage and appeared in a couple of Austrian films. Paul, like his character Victor Laszlo in Casablanca (1942), was avidly anti-fascist. He accordingly left continental Europe and went to London in 1935, first appearing on stage as Prince Albert in "Victoria the Great" two years later.

Henreid made his English-speaking motion picture debut in the popular drama Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939), as the sympathetic German master Max Staefel, who proves to be Chipping's truest friend and ally. After that, however, he became incongruously typecast as Nazi henchmen in Mad Men of Europe (1940) and Night Train to Munich (1940). That year, he moved to the United States (becoming a citizen the following year) and quickly established himself on Broadway with "Flight to the West", as a Ribbentrop-type Nazi consul. His powerful performance led to radio work in the serial "Joyce Jordan-Girl Interne" and a film contract with RKO in 1941.

This marked a turning point in Paul Henreid's career. He finally escaped the stereotypical Teutonic image and began to play heroic or romantic leads, his first being Joan of Paris (1942), opposite Michèle Morgan, as French RAF pilot Paul Lavallier. Significantly, his next film, Now, Voyager (1942), defined his new screen persona: debonnaire, cultured and genteel, lighting two cigarettes simultaneously, then passing one to Bette Davis. According to Henreid, this legendary (and later often lampooned) scene was almost cut from the film because the director, Irving Rapper, had concerns about it. Next came "Casablanca", where Henreid played the idealistic, sensitive patriot Victor Laszlo; the poorly received Bronte sisters biopic Devotion (1946), as an Irish priest; and a stalwart performance as a Polish count and Ida Lupino's love interest, In Our Time (1944).

After several dull romantic leads, Henreid reinvented himself yet again. He played a memorably athletic and lively Dutch pirate, the 'Barracuda', in RKO's colourful swashbuckler The Spanish Main (1945). Another of his best later performances was as a sadistic South African commandant in the underrated film noir Rope of Sand (1949), which re-united him with his former "Casablanca" co-stars Peter Lorre and Claude Rains. After the Arabian Technicolor adventure, Thief of Damascus (1952), Henreid's star began to fade. His last noteworthy appearance during the fifties was as an itinerant magician in the oriental extravaganza Siren of Bagdad (1953) . The most memorable of several in-jokes, had Henreid lighting two hookahs (water pipes) for one of his harem girls, spoofing his famous scene from "Now, Voyager".

Outspoken in his opposition to McCarthyism and adhering to his rights under the First Amendment, he was subsequently blacklisted as a "communist sympathizer" by the House Committee on Un- American Activities. In spite of the damage this did to his career, he re-emerged as a director of second features and television episodes for Screen Gems, Desilu and other companies. In 1957, Alfred Hitchcock (in defiance of the blacklist) hired him to direct several episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1955). Towards the end of his career, Paul Henreid directed his former "Now, Voyager" co-star Bette Davis in the camp melodrama Dead Ringer (1964) and toured with Agnes Moorehead on stage in a short-lived revival of "Don Juan in Hell"(1972- 73). Henreid died of pneumonia in a Santa Monica hospital in April 1992, after having suffered a stroke. He has the distinction of having not just one but two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for his films, and one for his television work.
BornJanuary 10, 1908
DiedMarch 29, 1992(84)
BornJanuary 10, 1908
DiedMarch 29, 1992(84)
IMDbProStarmeter
See rank
  • Awards

Photos220

Paul Henreid in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Paul Henreid in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Paul Henreid in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Paul Henreid and Margaret Lockwood in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Paul Henreid in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Paul Henreid in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Rex Harrison, Paul Henreid, and Margaret Lockwood in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Rex Harrison, Paul Henreid, C.V. France, and Kenneth Kent in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Paul Henreid in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Paul Henreid and Margaret Lockwood in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Paul Henreid and Margaret Lockwood in Night Train to Munich (1940)
Paul Henreid and Margaret Lockwood in Night Train to Munich (1940)

Known for

Ingrid Bergman, Humphrey Bogart, Peter Lorre, Claude Rains, Sydney Greenstreet, Paul Henreid, and Conrad Veidt in Casablanca (1942)
Casablanca
8.5
  • Victor Laszlo
  • 1942
Joan Bennett, Paul Henreid, and Leslie Brooks in Hollow Triumph (1948)
Hollow Triumph
6.7
  • Director(uncredited)
  • 1948
Bette Davis and Claude Rains in Now, Voyager (1942)
Now, Voyager
7.9
  • Jeremiah (Jerry) Durrance
  • 1942
Maureen O'Hara and Paul Henreid in The Spanish Main (1945)
The Spanish Main
6.3
  • Capt. Laurent Van Horn
  • 1945

Credits

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IMDbPro

Director

  • The Man and the City (1971)
    The Man and the City
  • Bracken's World (1969)
    Bracken's World
  • Diana Muldaur in The Last of the Powerseekers (1969)
    The Last of the Powerseekers
  • The Survivors (1969)
    The Survivors
  • Lee Majors, Barbara Stanwyck, Linda Evans, Peter Breck, and Richard Long in The Big Valley (1965)
    The Big Valley
  • Chuck Connors, Gerald Edwards, Ronald Howard, and Tom Nardini in Cowboy in Africa (1967)
    Cowboy in Africa
  • Iron Horse (1966)
    Iron Horse
  • The Road West (1966)
    The Road West
  • Burt Reynolds in Hawk (1966)
    Hawk
  • Lorne Greene, Michael Landon, Dan Blocker, and Pernell Roberts in Bonanza (1959)
    Bonanza
  • James Drury, Doug McClure, and John McIntire in The Virginian (1962)
    The Virginian
  • The Loner (1965)
    The Loner
  • The Third Man (1959)
    The Third Man
  • Ballad in Blue (1965)
    Ballad in Blue
  • Dead Ringer (1964)
    Dead Ringer

Actor

  • Richard Burton, Linda Blair, James Earl Jones, Louise Fletcher, Max von Sydow, and Paul Henreid in Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977)
    Exorcist II: The Heretic
  • Kate Reid and A Martinez in Death Among Friends (1975)
    Death Among Friends
  • The Failing of Raymond (1971)
    The Failing of Raymond
  • Paris 7000
  • The Madwoman of Chaillot (1969)
    The Madwoman of Chaillot
  • Judd for the Defense (1967)
    Judd for the Defense
  • It Takes a Thief (1968)
    It Takes a Thief
  • Operation Crossbow (1965)
    Operation Crossbow
  • The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1962)
    The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse
  • The Aquanauts (1960)
    The Aquanauts
  • Never So Few (1959)
    Never So Few
  • Holiday for Lovers (1959)
    Holiday for Lovers
  • Jane Wyman Presents the Fireside Theatre (1955)
    Jane Wyman Presents the Fireside Theatre
  • Hal Baylor, Hans Conried, and Chuck Hicks in Schlitz Playhouse (1951)
    Schlitz Playhouse
  • Ten Thousand Bedrooms (1957)
    Ten Thousand Bedrooms

Producer

  • Paul Henreid, Robert Carson, James Dobson, Margaret Field, Kathleen Hughes, Russell Johnson, Douglas Kennedy, Herb Margolis, Vera Miles, Lou Morheim, Virginia Mullen, Robert Sherman, and O.Z. Whitehead in For Men Only (1952)
    For Men Only
  • Joan Bennett, Paul Henreid, and Leslie Brooks in Hollow Triumph (1948)
    Hollow Triumph

Videos9

Official Trailer
Trailer 2:27
Official Trailer
Trailer
Trailer 2:35
Trailer
Official Trailer
Trailer 1:53
Official Trailer
Official Trailer
Trailer 2:01
Official Trailer
Official Trailer
Trailer 2:17
Official Trailer
Casablanca
Trailer 2:11
Casablanca
The Conspirators
Trailer 2:42
The Conspirators
Casablanca
Trailer 2:52
Casablanca
Now, Voyager
Trailer 2:16
Now, Voyager

Personal details

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    • January 10, 1908
    • Trieste, Austria-Hungary [now Trieste, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Italy]
    • March 29, 1992
    • Santa Monica, California, USA(pneumonia)
    • January 1, 1936 - March 29, 1992 (his death, 2 children)
    • Monika Henreid
  • Other works
    Stage: Appeared (as "Max Granada") in "Festival" on Broadway. Comedy. Written by Sam Spewack and Bella Spewack. Directed by Albert Marre. Longacre Theatre: 18 Jan 1955-5 Feb 1955 (23 performances). Cast: Ann Barlow, Leslie Alan Blatt, Patricia Englund, Betty Field (as "Sally Ann Peters"), Pat Hingle (as "Joe Foster"), Harry Shaw Lowe, Luba Malina, James Reese, Abbott Lee Ruskin, George Voskovec. Produced by Walter Fried in association with Felix Brentano.
  • Publicity listings
    • 2 Print Biographies
    • 1 Pictorial

Did you know

Edit
  • Trivia
    Was wary about appearing in Casablanca (1942) for fear that it would ruin his image and cause him to fade from the public eye. Ironically, it's the very film which immortalized him.
  • Quotes
    I never felt Lee Strasberg could act, and I fail to see how someone who can't act can teach acting.

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