Wolfgang Preiss
| Wolfgang Preiss | |
|---|---|
| Born |
February 27, 1910 Nuremberg, Bavaria, German Empire |
| Died | 27 November 2002 (aged 92) Bühl, Baden-Württemberg, Germany |
| Resting place | Baden-Baden |
| Years active | 1932–1996 |
| Spouse(s) | Ruth Preiss (1955-2002) (her death) |
Wolfgang Preiss (27 February 1910 – 27 November 2002) was a German theatre, film, and television actor.
The son of a teacher, Preiss studied philosophy, German, and drama in the early 1930s. He also took private acting classes with Hans Schlenck, making his stage début in Munich in 1932. He appeared in various theatre productions in Heidelberg, Königsberg, Bonn, Bremen, Stuttgart, and Berlin.
In 1942, he made his film début - he was specifically exempted from military service - in the UFA production Die grosse Liebe with Zarah Leander. After the end of the Second World War, Preiss returned to the theatre, and from 1949 worked extensively dubbing films into German.
In 1954, he returned to film acting, appearing in Alfred Weidenmann's Canaris. The following year, Preiss played the lead role of Claus von Stauffenberg in Falk Harnack's film Der 20. Juli, which dramatised the 1944 plot to assassinate Hitler. This role brought Preiss to popular attention and also the 1956 Federal Film Award.
From then on, Preiss was largely typecast in the role of the upright and obligation-conscious German officer to the other A-list actor playing the fanatic (i.e. Paul Scofield in The Train), a part he played in many films, later reprising it in numerous international productions, predominantly in Italy and the USA, while occasionally playing a more typically cynical or brutal Nazi officer.
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