Anecdotes

In Quentin Tarantino's 2009 film Inglourious Basterds, Lilian Harvey's duet with Willy Fritsch from the 1936 film "Glückskinder", Ich wollt' ich wär ein Huhn ("I wish I was a chicken") can be heard playing on a phonograph in the basement scene "La Louisiane" as well as in the extended scene "Lunch With Goebbels", as Joseph Goebbels (Sylvester Groth) happily sings a portion of the song after deciding to hold a private screening of the film. After the screening, cinema owner, Shosanna Dreyfus (Mélanie Laurent), under the alias "Emmanuelle Mimieux", comments on liking Lilian Harvey in the film - to which an irritated Goebbels angrily insists her name never be mentioned again in his presence.

German matinée idol of the 1930's, a cheerful singing and dancing star of musical comedies and operettas. Fritsch was trained at the Max Reinhardt School in Berlin and acted on screen from the early 1920's. He successfully made the transition to sound and was then popularly paired with the actress and dancer Lillian Harvey in several films. After the war, he eased into character roles.

Though he had joined the NSDAP, Fritsch tried to avoid getting involved in Nazi propaganda (except for his appearance in the 1944 aviator movie Junge Adler which earned him an entry on Goebbels' Gottbegnadeten list) and managed to survive the Hitler era without any loss of prestige.

Willy Fritsch was married with the actress Dinah Grace (1918-1963). After her death he retired from the film business.

After the bankruptcy of his father in 1912, the family moved to Berlin, where Fritsch sr. worked as an employee of the Siemens-Schuckert company. Young Willy originally planned an apprenticeship as a mechanic, but soon resorted to the occupation as an extra at the Großes Schauspielhaus theatre.

In the 30's - his fee went up to 40'000 RM per month.

With the movies "Spione" (1928) and "Frau im Mond" (1929), directed by Fritz Lang, Willy Fritsch was able to impersonate roles which varied from the usual cliché.

The producer Erich Pommer signed Willy Fritsch on. In the following years he especially monopolized the female audience with his sunny mind and youthful wag.

Father of Thomas Fritsch.

First man to record Lili Marlene (Lili Marleen) in Germany.

He continued to appear on stage and in movies like Wenn der weiße Flieder wieder blüht (When the White Lilacs Bloom Again) side by side with young Romy Schneider; his final film was 1964's I Learned It from Father (Das hab' ich von Papa gelernt) directed by Axel von Ambesser, in which he performed together with his son, actor Thomas Fritsch.

He was the son of a factory owner in Kattowitz (present-day Katowice) in the Prussian province of Silesia.

The post-war years offered Willy Fritsch many other roles but non of these roles could go on from the earlier successes.

He appeared in movies like Die keusche Susanne" (1926) in which he played together with Lilian Harvey for the first time. They became the German couple of dream as such in the 30's .The two were also engaged privately.

Wilhelm (Willy) Fritsch took acting lessons from the actor Gustav Sczimek and got first small roles with support from director Richard Gerner. Subsequently he got his first contract which assured him the modest sum of DM 65.-- per month.

Fritsch remained a popular juvenile figure in films and the theater, but his real success came after being paired with Lilian Harvey in 1928, when they appeared regularly together in UFA movies like Der Kongreß tanzt (Congress Dances) by Erik Charell, released every year thereafter until Harvey's emigration in 1939.

The actor Willy Fritsch was from the middle of the 20's the darling of the public and replaced the former lady-killers Bruno Kastner and Harry Liedtke.

From 1919 he attended Max Reinhardt's drama school at the Deutsches Theater, where he debuted with small roles, and made his feature debut in films as a supporting player in 1921's Miß Venus.

Willy Fritsch returned to Hamburg after World War II where he -without a permanent abode- he found an accommodation by Martha Keippert which is documented with the indicated dedication by Willy Fritsch. Fritsch wrote: "Dear Mrs. Martha Keippert, I say thank you again for the nice accommodation by my return to Hamburg as a fugitive." (24.08.1945).