ANDREWS ENGELMANN, actor (1901 – 1992)

Andrews Engelmann (Andrei Engelman, Baltic German) was born on March 23, 1901, in St. Petersburg, the son of a merchant. The Russian Revolution erupted in 1917. In 1918, after attending the Real Gymnasium in St. Petersburg, he graduated from high school. In 1919 he began studying medicine and entered the St. Petersburg Military Medical Academy. In 1921, he had an adventurous escape by crossing Finland’s border and making his way to Berlin. In 1922 he continued studies at the Friedrich Wilhelm University; He completed the physics course and the first clinical semester and, as a recognized refugee, received the Nansen passport (No. 26805) issued by the League of Nations; in the 1930s, this passport was considered “the longest passport in the world” because of the visas he acquired and inserted on numerous film trips "). During the semester break, Engelmann worked in France, as a construction worker in Houplines, and finally in film.

He appeared in his first film in 1923, shot in France, making in total of eleven silent films in France, Germany, Spain, Great Britain, and America. His last silent film was a role in the acclaimed Pabst production Tagebuch einer Verlorende  opposite Louise Brooks. (1929).

ABOVE: Engelmann in Wolves, (UK, 1930) and in Two Worlds (UK,1930)

His sound films from 1929 to 1960 numbered 53, of which 22 were shot in the Third Reich.  He most often played a nefarious type, a criminal, or a Russian or a ruthless Soviet Commissar, and even a Cossack in Karl Ritter’s Kadetten. His propaganda films for Karl Ritter included Kadetten, the unfinished Legion Condor, Über alles in der Welt, and GPU.

ABOVE: As the brutal Soviet Commissar Bokscha in Karl Ritter's GPU (1942). The ultra-rare lobby card from our Collection of the US release during the Cold War. BELOW, Director Karl Ritter and Engelmann confer on the GPU set during the filming.

ABOVE: Engelmann (third from left) as a British official visiting Germans held in a British concentration camp in 1939, in Ritter's Über alles in der Welt.

He also appeared in  Refugees for Gustav Ucicky, in Herbert Selpin’s Carl Peters, and in the Agfacolor smash hit Münchhausen. He played the Polish cinema manager in Ucicky's Heimkehr in an uncredited role.  In 1943/44 he played a Soviet farmer in the unfinished Ukraine Film GmbH feature film Der Rückkehrer. The film, without a soundtrack, is in the German federal film archives.

His wife was actress Charlotte Susa, with whom he was married since 1939.

After WWII, he made seven feature films between 1946 and 1960 in both France and the BRD. After an extraordinary international career in motion pictures, he retired and became a Swiss citizen, In 1953 André Engelmann settled in Basel, now a Swiss citizen – as an independent technical businessman and manufacturer of air conditioning devices for industry and telecommunications.  He died in 1992.

Below we have translated an interview he gave to Filmwelt magazine in 1934, well before he made most of his Third Reich films.


A CONVERSATION WITH ANDREWS ENGELMANN

It sounds like a modern fairy tale. The tall, slim man smiles comfortably and stretches out his long legs by pulling tirelessly on the thin papyrus: “Yes, I come straight from Spain. I filmed a little bit there, you know. Here in Germany, I played at Ufa, the commissioner in 'Refugees'. the commissioner in Fichtlin Island the 'Unknown', whose acquaintance with the military attaché is fatal. But then it's high time for me to get my car ready: I have an engagement in Sweden. I want to take this opportunity to see Scandinavia I'll have to take another look at it a bit, then I have to go down to Nice, where I have to film, you know. But maybe something will happen in Germany again - who can know?" He ducks his head and smiles fatalistically.

This is Andrews Engelmann, who has quickly become a much sought-after episodic player in all European centres of the film industry. A man who has the natural wandering instinct of the old comedians in his blood, who loves adventure has become a habit of life, who has become a philosopher through a hard fate and waits unmoved to see what the next day will bring without thinking about the next one. When you look at him as he enjoys drinking his tea, apparently completely unconcerned about what his life will be like, without a home, without followers, always in the car, always living out of a suitcase - but behind this friendly carefreeness there is a steel will that knows how to cope with fate, even if it hits him hard. “I'm actually a doctor,” he says. “Baltic German, but I was educated in Petersburg. In the middle of my studies, the revolution surprised me and, like all my compatriots, I endured it long enough. But as things got worse and worse, as I realized the pointlessness of this whole life, one morning I had enough and I left. I didn't have a car back then - it wouldn't have been of any use to me. I walked to the Finnish border, worse as a travelling boy, and on that occasion I perfected my talent for starving. In a not very presentable state. "

"One morning at eight o'clock I reached the  border and found a compassionate soul who took care of me. In the same house on the first floor of which resided the Cheka, whose only job was to catch refugees, I was hidden in a stable, and I lay there, hidden under potatoes, until five o'clock the next morning. Then I suddenly heard the farmer's voice: ‘Quickly, get up.' The Cheka officials were busy searching a train, and the farmer took me along a tricky dirt road to a river on which pretty pieces of ice were already floating because it was the end of October. He looked at me with his big blue eyes and raised his hand heavily. 'There's Finland, little brother,' he said slowly, nodded to me again and turned around. 'Over there is Finland,' I repeated to myself, 'Over there is freedom and a new life'. And then I was standing in the river with all my things and I can honestly say that I have never been so cold in my life. But I got through and happily reached the other side. I walked for four hours before I saw anything alive, and it was a cow. But where there are cows, even in such wastelands there are usually people, and I really met a shepherd. The man wasn't very talkative, but he had a bag of sugar with him - and I had completely forgotten what that was in Petersburg. I don't think anyone has ever poured so much sugar into the coffee brew the man had with him, but no matter what, I now knew what paradise was like. And then everything went on as normal and of course, I went to Berlin. We Balts always want to go to Berlin. I still had enough money to continue my studies. I also did my medical doctorate in Berlin, but when I took the state exam, I ran out of money. Just as I was about to leave, the mark was stabilized, and of course, it wasn't enough again. "

"Berlin had receded into the distance – but Paris was within reach. I looked around Paris and didn't really know what to do. One day I met a gentleman who looked me carefully from head to toe - and that's almost two meters - then he said slowly: 'If you could do a Russian dance, I would have something for you.' I didn't practice Russian dances at university or in France, but I would have said yes to anything anyone asked me. Two days later I was standing in the film studio and dancing the Cossack dance, and when I went back to my hotel I found an agent who had seen me in the studio and signed me up for the 'Théâtre des Variétés'. There I played a silly Mr. Sakuskin every evening for six months and danced with my long legs: it was very amusing and particularly enjoyable because the result was a car that I have grown attached to ever since. And then I was employed a lot in films: I'm supposed to be a very good actor for certain things. But I couldn't stay in one place for long."

"One day I drove from Paris to London, from London to Berlin, from Berlin to Nice, from Nice to Stockholm, back to Spain, then back to Germany - wherever there was a film studio was my home for a few months. There is hardly a major film company in Europe that I haven't worked for. The longest with Rex Ingram, who you probably also know in Germany. I would like to stay in Germany for a while, but as I already told you, I have to move on." "Where did you like it best, Mr. Engelmann?" He laughed: "Where I had the best role." "Will you come back to Germany?" "Certainly. Since I no longer have a home, this is my home. You must not forget that I lived in Berlin for years. And then something indefinable draws me to German film. Things are working wonderfully here, in Germany." "But now I have to go to Scandinavia. I won't be calm again until I'm behind the wheel. Write to me about what's new here when films come out. I'm really interested in that."

He pressed He handed me his card, we shook hands, and he disappeared into the elevator with long strides. A strange, peculiar wanderer, I thought, a gypsy with all the comforts of modern times. And then I read the card that had the words under his name: "Speaks German, English, French, Spanish, Russian.”



(“Ein Schauspieler wandert durch Europa.” Filmwelt, Nr. 29, 1934, Berlin.)