Alexander Granach
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Alexander Granach (April 18, 1890 – March 14, 1945) was a popular German actor in the 1920s and 1930s who immigrated to the United States in 1938. Granach was born Jessaja Gronach in Werbowitz (Wierzbowce/Werbiwci) (Horodenka district, Austrian Galicia then, now Verbivtsi, Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast, Ukraine), to Jewish parents and rose to theatrical prominence at the Volksbühne in Berlin. Granach entered films in 1922; among the most widely exhibited of his silent efforts was the vampire classic Nosferatu (1922), in which the actor was cast as Knock, the lunatic counterpart to Renfield, effectively a substitute name for Dracula. He co-starred in such major early German talkies as Kameradschaft (1931). The Jewish Granach fled to the Soviet Union when Hitler came to power. When the Soviet Union also proved inhospitable, he settled in Hollywood, where he made his first American film appearance as Kopalski in Ernst Lubitsch's Ninotchka (1939) for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Granach proved indispensable to film makers during the war years, effectively portraying both dedicated Nazis (he was Julius Streicher in The Hitler Gang, 1944) and loyal anti-fascists. Perhaps his best role was as Gestapo Inspector Alois Gruber in Fritz Lang's Hangmen Also Die! (1943). His last film appearance was in MGM's The Seventh Cross (1944), in which almost the entire supporting cast was prominent European refugees.
Filmography · 42
Nosferatu
1922 · Knock
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
1939 · Soldier (uncredited)
Accident
1928
For Whom the Bell Tolls
1943 · Paco
Ninotchka
1939 · Comrade Kopalski
Die berühmte Frau
1927 · Diener bei Alfredo
Foreign Correspondent
1940 · Hotel Valet (uncredite...
Hangmen Also Die!
1943 · Gestapo Insp. Alois Gr...
Danton
1921 · Minor Role (rumored)
Paganini
1923 · Ferucchio
Northwest Rangers
1942 · Pierre - Man in Casino
Camera obscura
1921
Three Russian Girls
1943 · Major Braginski
A Man Betrayed
1941 · T. Amato
Mission to Moscow
1943 · Russian Air Force Offi...
The Seventh Cross
1944 · Zillich
Svengali
1927 · Geiger Gecko
So Ends Our Night
1941 · The Pole
Comradeship
1931 · Kasper
Joan of Paris
1942 · Gestapo Agent
The Hitler Gang
1944 · Julius Streicher
Voice in the Wind
1944 · Angelo
I.N.R.I. – A Film of Humanity
1923 · Judas Ischariot
Radiohead X Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror
2025 · Knock - ein Häusermakl...
Navarro the Dancer
1923 · Clegg
1914: The Last Days Before the War
1931 · Jaurès' Friend
Warning Shadows
1923 · Shadowplayer
Wrecking Crew
1942 · Joe Poska
The Theft of the Mona Lisa
1931 · Redner
Lucrezia Borgia
1922 · ein Gefangener
Half Way to Shanghai
1942 · Mr. Nikolas
Danton
1931 · Marat
Man by the Roadside
1923 · Shoemaker
Gypsies
1936 · Danilo, rich gypsy cam...
Pavement Butterfly
1929 · Coco
My Buddy
1944 · Tim Oberta
The Struggle
1936 · Rovelli (uncredited)
The Twelfth Hour
1930 · Karsten (Archive foota...
The Adjutant of the Czar
1929 · Stranger
A Man's a Man
1931
Earth Spirit
1923 · Schigolch
Das letzte Fort
1929 · Gestino