Anton Diffring

Anton Diffring was a German-born actor whose classical features and imperious demeanor garnered him numerous roles as a Nazi military officer, landing him parts in war dramas throughout the 1950s, '60s, and '70s. Diffring fled Nazi Germany in 1936, settling first in Canada and later, after WWII, in the United States and Britain. Despite obvious allegiances to the Allied forces during wartime, Diffring, when he began his acting career in the '50s, was immediately typecast as a villainous Nazi officer, appearing as a haughty military taskmaster in such classic films as "The Blue Max" (1966), "Where Eagles Dare" (1968), and "Operation: Daybreak" (1975). Diffring attempted to break away from obvious villain roles, with stints in TV and stage acting, but the lure of film work proved too great. In 1966, Diffring starred opposite Austrian actor Oskar Werner in François Truffaut's "Fahrenheit 451," a role that proved his mettle as more than just a character actor. With his career winding down in the '80s, Diffring took on an increasing number of TV roles including, most notably, the part of Adolf Hitler's foreign minister on the 1983 mini-series "The Winds of War." Diffring died on May 20, 1989, in his home in the south of France.