Trivia

According to quite a lot of his colleagues, he was very friendly and helpful. Moreover it has been reported, he proverbially always had a smile on his face and seemed to be very lucky. Among movie people he was also kept for one of the best actors in the Italian cinema era, he was part of. Only few colleagues claim, they recognized psychological problems, he could have had, for example actor Robert Hoffmann and a former companion from his UCLA time, who wrote an article about him.

He provided the role of The Stranger to actor Tony Anthony and played the villain in The Stranger's first movie Un dollar entre les dents (1967) as a favor for Anthony. The part became Anthony's most famous role besides his Blindman, le justicier aveugle (1971) and he repeated it three times. Several months before Frank Wolff's death, according to Anthony himself, Frank Wolff asked him for a similar favor, wanting the role in Blindman, le justicier aveugle (1971), which was finally taken by Ringo Starr. It was kind of deal between them, Anthony would provide him role, because Wolff had done him a favor earlier. But the producers wanted Ringo Starr for the role - Wolff was dropped and had a falling out with Anthony. About one year later Frank Wolff killed himself. There have always been rumors, one reason for the suicide was, he saw his career at an end/thought he couldn't get the roles he wanted anymore.

Died before shooting of his last movie Quand les femmes perdirent leur queue (1972) was finished.

Actor Robert Hoffmann, who starred in Alberto De Martino's Perversion (1969), co-starring Frank Wolff, settled in his Hilton Hotel apartment in Rome after his suicide, because they had the same agent (Michele Pietravalle) at this time. Hoffmann, searching immediately for a roof over the head, didn't care much about the fact his predecessor had been found dead in the bath tub.

He became quite good friends with director Monte Hellman when they studied and worked together at the UCLA in the 1950s. As a result, one of his first movies was Hellman's La Bête de la Caverne Hantée (1959).

Starred and co-starred in movies by most of the most important Italian western directors of all time: Sergio Leone, Sergio Corbucci, Enzo G. Castellari, Giuseppe Colizzi, Giuliano Carnimeo (aka Anthony Ascott) and Sergio Sollima. Only with Sollima he did no western, but the agent-action-adventure Agent 3S3, massacre au soleil (1966).

Though he often played Italian characters in films like Salvatore Giuliano (1962), Wolff was of German descent and had no Italian ancestry.

His father was a Bay Area doctor.

His parents were politically active and more or less left-wing. They supported corresponding theater projects at the UCLA, when Frank Wolff studied there in the 1950s.

Was offered the role of the villain in Sergio Leone's legendary Pour une poignée de dollars (1964), but dropped it more or less for artistic reasons.

His parents helped set up the bookings for an anti-war play at the UCLA titled "The time is tomorrow" in the early 1950s. Frank Wolff appeared in the tour version of this UCLA production.

His last agent was Michele Pietravalle in Rome.

Went to Italy in the early 1960s for making movies there on the advice of director Roger Corman. He had starred in three Corman movies 'The Beast from the Haunted Cave (1960)', (Ski Troop Attack (1960) and Atlas (1961)) with Michael Forest before the two became fast friends, traveled to Italy, and were roommates for a while while acting in Italian movies.

Actor Brett Halsey wrote a book, called 'The Magnificent Strangers', which includes a lot of characters based on Halsey's real movie business colleagues and is kind of autobiographic in a way. The character Frank Ward, who's suicide is thematized in the book, is said to have been written with Frank Wolff in mind.

Directed two original one acts for the advanced direction class at the UCLA: "The woman in Strindberg's room" and "The lucky guy".

Won two times the UCLA best actor award: for "Macbeth" (1951), playing the title role, and "The Lower Depths" (1952), playing Satin.