John Wengraf

Profile

Emigrating to England in 1933 as the Nazis began their rise to power, Wengraf appeared unbilled in a couple of films there, as well as in some of the first BBC live-television shows ever presented but his career began to languish. In late 1941, however, he had the good fortune of appearing on Broadway with Helen Hayes in "Candle in the Wind" and decided to stay. The following year he headed west and settled permanently in the Los Angeles area. A dark, cold-eyed, thin-lipped player with a precise, meticulous air about him, he found himself invariably playing the very characters he detested. Some of his more nefarious nasties surfaced in such films as the Humphrey Bogart classic Sahara (1943/I), as well as The Boy from Stalingrad (1943), U-Boat Prisoner (1944) and Till We Meet Again (1944). In postwar years, he was often spotted portraying ethnic professionals (scientists, doctors, professors, foreign royalty). Some of the more quality pictures he enhanced were Tomorrow Is Forever (1946); Count Von Papen in 5 Fingers (1952); and Ronchin in the Ethel Merman musical Call Me Madam (1953). Although Wengraf never made it to the very top of the Hollywood character ranks, he remained a throughly strong and reliable player. In the 1950s and 1960s he transferred his talents to TV, appearing on a number of dramatic showcases and on such popular programs as "The Untouchables" (1959), "Hawaiian Eye" (1959), "The Man from U.N.C.L.E." (1964) and "The Time Tunnel" (1966). His last few films included minor roles in the war-themed Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), Hitler (1962) and Ship of Fools (1965). He retired in 1966, and died in Santa Barbara, California, at age 77, on May 4, 1974. Born : 22nd-Apr-1897

Movie Credits

Judgment at Nuremberg

In 1947, four German judges who served on the bench during the Nazi regime face a military tribunal to answer charges of crimes against humanity. Chief Justice Haywood hears evidence and testimony not only from lead defendant Ernst Janning and his defense attorney Hans Rolfe, but also from the widow of a Nazi general, an idealistic U.S. Army captain and reluctant witness Irene Wallner.
Released : 18th-Dec-1961

The Prize

A group of Nobel laureates descends on Stockholm to accept their awards. Among them is American novelist Andrew Craig, a former literary luminary now writing pulp detective stories to earn a living. Craig, who is infamous for his drinking and womanizing, formulates a wild theory that physics prize winner Dr. Max Stratman has been replaced by an impostor, embroiling Craig and his chaperone in a Cold War kidnapping plot.
Released : 25th-Dec-1963

Ship of Fools

Passengers on a ship traveling from Mexico to Europe in the 1930s represent society at large in that era. The crew is German, including the ship's Dr. Schumann, who falls in love with one of the passengers, La Condesa. A young American woman, Jenny, is traveling with the man she loves, David. Jenny is fascinated and puzzled by just who some of the other passengers are.
Released : 29th-Jul-1965

The Pride and the Passion

During the Napoleonic Wars, when the French have occupied Spain, some Spanish guerrilla soldiers are going to move a big cannon across Spain in order to help the British defeat the French. A British officer is there to accompany the Spanish and along the way, he falls in love with the leader's girl.
Released : 10th-Jul-1957

12 to the Moon

Landed on the moon, Capt. John Anderson and his fellow astronauts quickly find their mission threatened – first by the disappearance of two team members, then by a troubling interaction with aliens who appear to be living within the moon itself. The aliens have weapons that could plunge parts of Earth into another ice age, and they're aiming for the United States.
Released : 3rd-Feb-1960

Gog

A mechanical brain is programmed to sabotage the government's secret lab while working on the first space station.
Released : 4th-Jun-1954

Portrait in Black

A pair of lovers plot to kill the woman's rich husband.
Released : 27th-Jul-1960

The French Line

Oil heiress Mame Carson takes an incognito cruise so that men will love her for her body, not her money.
Released : 8th-Feb-1954

The Return of Dracula

After a vampire leaves his native Balkans, he murders a Czech artist, assumes his identity, and moves in with the dead man's American cousins.
Released : 21st-May-1958

The Lovable Cheat

Posing as a wealthy Parisian, Mercadet fleeces friends and casual acquaintances alike. He is forced into this life of crime to keep up appearances, so that his daughter Julie can land herself a rich husband.
Released : 11th-May-1949

Valerie

After the American Civil War, former Union Major John Garth marries pretty settler Valerie but tragedy strikes and the two spouses end up in court where they give two different conflicting accounts of their marriage.
Released : 1st-Aug-1957

The Razor's Edge

An adventurous young man goes off to find himself and loses his socialite fiancée in the process. But when he returns 10 years later, she will stop at nothing to get him back, even though she is already married.
Released : 19th-Nov-1946

Week-End at the Waldorf

Anything can happen during a weekend at New York's Waldorf-Astoria: a glamorous movie star meets a world-weary war correspondent and mistakes him for a jewel thief; a soldier learns that without an operation he'll die and so looks for one last romance with a beautiful but ambitious stenographer; a cub reporter tries to get the goods on a shady man's dealing with a foreign potentate.
Released : 4th-Oct-1945

5 Fingers

During WWII, the valet to the British Ambassador to Ankara sells British secrets to the Germans while trying to romance a refugee Polish countess.
Released : 22nd-Feb-1952

Hitler

Richard Basehart stars as one of the most influential and one of the most reviled men in history in this probing psychological study of a man who nearly gained dominance over the entire western world--at the cost of millions of lives--Hitler.
Released : 21st-Mar-1962

Oh, Men! Oh, Women!

Arthur Turner's bored housewife Mildred seeks psychiatric help from Dr. Alan Coles who also has his own emotional problems to solve.
Released : 22nd-Feb-1957

Paris Playboys

Sach is the exact double of a famous French scientist who has invented a powerful rocket fuel. Enemy agents, mistaking Sach for the scientist, attempt to kidnap him and get the formula for the fuel.
Released : 7th-Mar-1954

Lucky Jordan

Lucky Jordan is a gangster living in New York City and when he's drafted into the army, he tries to escape duty by using an old con woman named Annie to convince the draft board he's needed at home. When that fails, Jordan is sent to boot camp, but he doesn't stay there long. He takes a beautiful USO worker hostage and flees back to New York. There, he learns that a rival gangster is plotting against America.
Released : 16th-Nov-1942

Tropic Zone

A fugitive from the police helps a beautiful farmer run her struggling banana plantation.
Released : 14th-Jan-1953

The Disembodied

When men on a photo safari stumble into a misanthropic doctor’s remote camp with a wounded comrade, the doctor's restless wife supplements her usual pursuit (voodoo, especially as a way to off her husband) with a new one: seduction. As men lose their hearts (sometimes literally) to the alluring voodoo priestess, she embarks on a killing spree that turns the jungle blood red.
Released : 25th-Aug-1957

Never Say Goodbye

In present-day U.S., Dr. Michael Parker, a prominent surgeon, unexpectedly runs into his German-born wife whom he thought was dead. Victor, an artist and his "dead" wife's now boyfriend, berates Dr. Parker for "killing" her. The bulk of the story flashes back to Austria during World War II as we learn how Dr. Parker met and married his wife, and the one mistake that may have cost him his family.
Released : 10th-Mar-1956

Tomorrow Is Forever

In 1918, Elizabeth MacDonald learns that her husband, John Andrew, has been killed in the war. Elizabeth bears John's son and eventually marries her kindly boss. Unknown to her, John has survived but is horribly disfigured and remains in Europe. Years later, on the eve of World War II, Elizabeth refuses to agree to her son's request to enlist and is stunned when an eerily familiar stranger named Kessler arrives from abroad and becomes involved.
Released : 20th-Feb-1946

Convoy

A tale of life on board a Royal Navy cruiser assigned to protect the vital convoys between America and England during WWII.
Released : 28th-Sep-1940

U-Boat Prisoner

Merchant seaman Archie Gibbs manages to survive when his ship is torpedoed by a German submarine. Disguising himself in the uniform of a dead Nazi spy, Gibbs is picked up by the Nazi U-boat. He manages to convince the German sailors that he's the spy, and in this guise he tries to rescue a group of captured Allied scientists.
Released : 25th-Jul-1944

Sahara

Sergeant Joe Gunn and his tank crew pick up five British soldiers, a Frenchman and a Sudanese man with an Italian prisoner crossing the Libyan Desert to rejoin their command after the fall of Tobruk. Tambul, the Sudanese leads them to an abandoned desert fortress where they hope to find water. Soon a detachment of German soldiers arrives and attempts to barter food for water, but Gunn and his followers refuse. When the Germans attack, Gunn leads his desert-weary men in a desperate battle, hoping that British reinforcements can arrive in time.
Released : 22nd-Sep-1943

Strange Affair

Eminent psychiatrist Dr. Brenner invites cartoonist Bill Harrison and his wife, Jack, to a banquet honoring war refugees. Bill volunteers to pick up fellow psychiatrist Dr. Baumler at the train station, but the man vanishes when he has Bill stop so he can use a pay phone. At the dinner, Bill and Jack are seated with Brenner's daughter, Freda, and, to Bill's surprise, another man is introduced as Baumler -- who dies moments later.
Released : 5th-Oct-1944

Wake of the Red Witch

Captain Ralls fights Dutch shipping magnate Mayrant Sidneye for the woman he loves, Angelique Desaix, and for a fortune in gold aboard the Red Witch.
Released : 30th-Dec-1948

The Gambler from Natchez

A discharged army Captain returns home to New Orleans to take revenge on the men who murdered his father.
Released : 4th-Aug-1954

T-Men

Two U.S. Treasury ("T-men") agents go undercover in Detroit, and then Los Angeles, in an attempt to break a U.S. currency counterfeiting ring.
Released : 15th-Dec-1947

Sofia

A former OSS agent is assigned to rescue two atomic scientists from the dastardly Russians and spirit them away from behind the Iron Curtain.
Released : 3rd-Sep-1948

The Racers

An Italian daredevil turns Grand Prix driver and works his way up to Le Mans with his ballerina lover.
Released : 4th-Feb-1955

Sealed Verdict

John Hoyt plays a high-ranking Nazi being prosecuted by an army tribunal in the aftermath of World War II. Sentenced to death, the general appeals to the American investigating Major (Ray Milland), claiming mitigating circumstances, and providing the names of witnesses who will clear his name. This sends the Major in a search through the ruins of post-war Germany to determine the degree of the general's guilt.
Released : 5th-Nov-1948

Mission to Moscow

Ambassador Joseph Davies is sent by FDR to Russia to learn about the Soviet system and returns to America as an advocate of Stalinism.
Released : 29th-Apr-1943

Sailors Three

Three sailors get drunk while on shore leave and end up on the wrong ship. When they realise their mistake they scramble off it and onto their warship, HMS Ferocious. However, they soon realise that the vessel they have boarded is not the Ferocious but a German battleship.
Released : 14th-Dec-1940

Dangerous Comment

A young pilot, annoyed at not being selected to take part in a raid on an enemy target, moans to his fiancée, who in turn chatters to a friend at a cocktail bar.
Released : 18th-May-1940

All Hands

From a series of propaganda films made to raise awareness of the risks of idle gossip providing vital information to enemy spies and collaborators. This Ealing Studios production features well-known 1940s actor John Mills, playing a sailor whose girlfriend thoughtlessly blunders away vital wartime secrets. The consequences prove disastrous when his boat next leaves to cross the English Channel.
Released : 31st-May-1940

Night Train to Munich

Czechoslovakia, March 1939, on the eve of World War II. As the German invaders occupy Prague, inventor Axel Bomasch manages to flee and reach England; but those who need to put his knowledge at the service of the Nazi war machine, in order to carry out their evil plans of destruction, will stop at nothing to capture him.
Released : 31st-Aug-1940

The Seventh Cross

In Nazi Germany in 1936 seven men escape from a concentration camp. The camp commander puts up seven crosses and, as the Gestapo returns each escapee he is put to death on a cross. The seventh cross is still empty as George Heisler seeks freedom in Holland.
Released : 24th-Jul-1944

Hell and High Water

A privately-financed scientist and his colleagues hire an ex-Navy officer to conduct an Alaskan submarine expedition in order to prevent a Red Chinese anti-American plot that may lead to World War III. Mixes deviously plotted schoolboy fiction with submarine spectacle and cold war heroics.
Released : 6th-Feb-1954

The Desert Rats

In North Africa, German Field Marshal Rommel and his troops have successfully fended off British forces, and now intend to take Tobruk, an important port city. A ramshackle group of Australian reinforcements sent to combat the Germans is put under the command of British Captain MacRoberts. The unruly Aussies immediately clash with MacRoberts, a gruff, strict disciplinarian, however this unorthodox team must band together to protect Tobruk from the German forces.
Released : 20th-May-1953

The Moon in the Yellow River

Television broadcast of The Moon in the Yellow River by Denis Johnston.
Released : 28th-Dec-1938

The Boy from Stalingrad

If J.M. Barrie had had a hand in Tarkovsky's IVAN'S CHILDHOOD, it might like something like this bizarre boys' adventure confection. Surprised by the advancing German Army while gathering wheat outside their village, a spunky band of Russian adolescents employs a combination of wits and heroic self-sacrifice to defeat a Nazi battalion, blow up a tank, and save the people of Stalingrad from imminent destruction. A rarely-seen entry in Hollywoood's brief wartime spate of pro-Soviet propaganda films, THE BOY FROM STALINGRAD stars Serbian-American child actor Bobby Samarzich, who went on to found one of Southern California's greatest tamburitza bands.
Released : 20th-May-1943

TV Credits

One Step Beyond

Ernest - Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond is an American anthology series created by Merwin Gerard. The original series ran for three seasons on ABC from January 1959 to July 1961.
Released : 20th-Jan-1959

Lux Video Theatre

Landau - Lux Video Theatre is an American anthology series that was produced from 1950 until 1959. The series presented both comedy and drama in original teleplays, as well as abridged adaptations of films and plays.
Released : 2nd-Oct-1950

Bat Masterson

Colonel Anders Dorn - Bat Masterson is an American Western television series which showed a fictionalized account of the life of real-life marshal/gambler/dandy Bat Masterson. The title character was played by Gene Barry and the half-hour black-and-white shows ran on NBC from 1958 to 1961. The series was produced by Ziv Television Productions, the company responsible for such hit series as Sea Hunt and Highway Patrol.
Released : 8th-Oct-1958

The Detectives

- The Detectives is an American crime drama series which ran on ABC during its first two seasons, and on NBC during its third and final season. The series, starring motion picture star Robert Taylor, was produced by Four Star Television.
Released : 16th-Oct-1959

Jericho

- Jericho is an American espionage series set during World War II. The series stars John Leyton, Don Francks and Marino Masé as secret agents, and aired on CBS from September 1966, to January 1967.
Released : 15th-Sep-1966

The Time Tunnel

Dr. Hans Kleinemann - The Time Tunnel is a 1966–1967 U.S. color science fiction TV series, written around a theme of time travel adventure. The show was creator-producer Irwin Allen's third science fiction television series, released by 20th Century Fox and broadcast on ABC. The show ran for one season of 30 episodes. Reruns are viewable on cable and by internet streaming. A pilot for a new series was produced in 2002, although it was not picked up.
Released : 9th-Sep-1966

77 Sunset Strip

- Stu Bailey and Jeff Spencer are the wisecracking, womanizing private-detective heroes of this Warner Brothers drama. They work out of an office located at 77 Sunset Strip in Los Angeles, California, right next door to a snazzy restaurant where Kookie works as a valet. The finger-snapping, slang-talking Kookie occasionally helps Stu and Jeff with their cases, and eventually becomes a full-fledged member of the detective agency. Rex Randolph and J.R. Hale also join the firm, and Suzanne is their leggy secretary.
Released : 10th-Oct-1958

Bourbon Street Beat

- "Bourbon Street Beat" is a private detective series produced by Warner Brothers Television which aired on the ABC network from October 5, 1959, to July 4, 1960. It featured Richard Long as Rex Randolph, Andrew Duggan as Cal Calhoun, Van Williams as Kenny Madison, and Arlene Howell as Melody Lee Mercer, the secretary at the New Orleans detective agency in which they worked. The show is set in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA and revolves around the lives of Rex Randolph (Long) and Cal Calhoun (Duggan), who run a detective agency called Randolph and Calhoun — Special Services. The agency is based in the Absinthe House, a French Quarter nightclub on Bourbon Street.
Released : 5th-Oct-1959

General Electric Theater

- General Electric Theater is an American anthology series hosted by Ronald Reagan that was broadcast on CBS radio and television. The series was sponsored by General Electric's Department of Public Relations.
Released : 1st-Feb-1953

Hawaiian Eye

- Private Eyes Tom Lopaka and Tracy Steele are based out of Hawaiian Village Resort where they work both hotel security and are hired by others to look into various matters. They're helped by their trusty right-hand man Kazuo Kim who runs a taxi company and is always eager to help them.
Released : 7th-Oct-1959

The Millionaire

Count Victor Turec - An anthology series that explored the ways sudden and unexpected wealth changed life for better or for worse. It told the stories of people who were given one million dollars from a benefactor who insisted they never know him, with one exception.
Released : 19th-Jan-1955

Matinee Theater

- Matinee Theater is an American anthology series that aired on NBC during the Golden Age of Television, from 1955 to 1958. The series, which ran daily in the afternoon, was frequently live. It was produced by Albert McCleery, Darrell Ross, George Cahan and Frank Price with executive producer George Lowther. McCleery had previously produced the live series Cameo Theatre which introduced to television the concept of theater-in-the-round, TV plays staged with minimal sets. Jim Buckley of the Pewter Plough Playhouse recalled: When Al McCleery got back to the States, he originated a most ambitious theatrical TV series for NBC called Matinee Theater: to televise five different stage plays per week live, airing around noon in order to promote color TV to the American housewife as she labored over her ironing. Al was the producer. He hired five directors and five art directors. Richard Bennett, one of our first early presidents of the Pewter Plough Corporation, was one of the directors and I was one of the art directors and, as soon as we were through televising one play, we had lunch and then met to plan next week’s show. That was over 50 years ago, and I’m trying to think; I believe the TV art director is his own set decorator —yes, of course! It had to be, since one of McCleery’s chief claims to favor with the producers was his elimination of the setting per se and simply decorating the scene with a minimum of props. It took a bit of ingenuity.
Released : 31st-Oct-1955

Cavalcade of America

German Colonel - Cavalcade of America is an anthology drama series that was sponsored by the DuPont Company, although it occasionally presented a musical, such as an adaptation of Show Boat, and condensed biographies of popular composers. It was initially broadcast on radio from 1935 to 1953, and later on television from 1952 to 1957. Originally on CBS, the series pioneered the use of anthology drama for company audio advertising. Cavalcade of America documented historical events using stories of individual courage, initiative and achievement, often with feel-good dramatizations of the human spirit's triumph against all odds. This was consistent with DuPont's overall conservative philosophy and legacy as an American company dating back to 1802. The company's motto, "Maker of better things for better living through chemistry," was read at the beginning of each program, and the dramas emphasized humanitarian progress, particularly improvements in the lives of women, often through technological innovation.
Released : 1st-Oct-1952

Telephone Time

- Telephone Time is an American anthology drama series that aired on CBS in 1956, and on ABC from 1957 to 1958. The series features plays by John Nesbitt who hosted the first season. Frank C. Baxter hosted the 1957 and 1958 seasons. The program was directed by Arthur Hiller.
Released : 8th-Apr-1956

The Walter Winchell File

- The Walter Winchell File is the title of a television crime drama series that initially aired from 1957 to 1958, dramatizing cases from the New York City Police Department that were covered in the New York Daily Mirror. The series featured columnist and announcer Walter Winchell, John Larch, George Cisar, Robert Anderson, Robert Brubaker, Dolores Donlon, and Gene Barry, a year before he was cast in the lead of NBC's Bat Masterson. Thirty-nine episodes were produced; the first twenty-six aired on ABC during the 1957-1958 season, and the final thirteen were seen in syndication in 1959. Among the guest stars was the child actor Dennis Holmes, who played 7-year-old Allie Marisch in the 1957 episode "Thou Shalt Not Kill."
Released : 2nd-Oct-1957

Dangerous Assignment

- A U.S. government agent travels the world on undercover missions in this 1950s series. Star Brian Donlevy originated the role on radio in the '40s.
Released : 1st-Jan-1952

Panic!

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Released : 5th-Mar-1957

The Third Man

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Released : 2nd-Oct-1959

Behind Closed Doors

Von Elm - Behind Closed Doors is an American drama series set during the Cold War hosted by and occasionally starring Bruce Gordon in the role of Commander Matson. The series, which aired on NBC from October 2, 1958, to April 9, 1959, focuses, among other themes, on how the former Soviet Union stole American missile secrets and proposes steps to prevent further espionage. Behind Closed Doors is based on the files and experiences of Rear Admiral Ellis M. Zacharias, who offers comments at the end of each segment. Behind Closed Doors, a Screen Gems production, replaced Jackie Cooper's sitcom The People's Choice, followed the NBC quiz show, Twenty-One, and preceded the The Tennessee Ernie Ford Show. Its competition was The Pat Boone Chevy Show on ABC and Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater western anthology series on CBS.
Released : 2nd-Oct-1958