By Karen Thomas, Writer, Producer and Director of CINEMA’S EXILES: FROM HITLER TO HOLLYWOOD
| Month/day | Year | Event | |
| May 25 | 1917 | The German High Command decides on the need to consolidate Germany’s film industry. The studio will be called Universum Film AG, or Ufa | |
| November 11 | 1918 | World War I ends with Germany’s defeat | |
| November 17 | 1918 | Armistice signed | |
| 1918 | Disgusted with the terms of the Armistice, Adolf Hitler decides to go into politics | ||
| 1918-19 | Richard Werner Heymann and Frederick Hollander begin composing satirical songs that criticize contemporary German society for director Max Reinhardt’s Sound and Smoke cabaret | ||
| June 28 | 1919 | The Treaty of Versailles is signed | |
| February 26 | 1920 | The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari premieres in Berlin (Erich Pommer, producer, Fritz Lang, scenarist; Conrad Veidt, actor; Hans von Twardowski, actor) | |
| 1920 | Hollywood producer Samuel Goldwyn sails to Europe to find pictures for the American market. He goes to Berlin to see Caligari. | ||
| March 19 | 1921 | The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari premieres in New York New York’s Capitol Theater. The box office hit in Germany is a box office disaster in America | |
| October 6 | 1921 | Destiny premieres in Berlin (Erich Pommer, producer; Fritz Lang, director) The critics in Europe rave | |
| 1921 | Paul Kohner leaves Czechoslovakia to work with Carl Laemmle at Universal Studios | ||
| March 4 | 1922 | Nosferatu premieres in Berlin (F.W. Murnau, director; Karl Freund, camera) | |
| December 22 | 1922 | Director Ernst Lubitsch is invited to Hollywood to work with Mary Pickford; he arrives in New York on SS President Roosevelt | |
| late 1922/1923 | Actress Pola Negri goes to Hollywood | ||
| July – November | 1923 | Between July and November, inflation in Germany upends the economy | |
| February 14 | 1924 | Die Niebelungen premieres in Berlin (Fritz Lang, director) | |
| June 6 | 1924 | Germany accepts the Dawes Plan; the German mark is stabilized | |
| 1924 | The German film industry (UFA) is in difficulty; it needs financial assistance | ||
| December | 1924 | Nazi Party candidates gain four seats in the Reichstag (Germany’s Parliament) | |
| December 23 | 1924 | The Last Laugh premieres in Berlin (Producer, Erich Pommer; F.W. Murnau, director; Karl Freund, cinematographer) When The Last Laugh is screened in America, telegrams pour in from Hollywood, “Where and with what cameras did you shoot this film?” Karl Freund has strapped the camera to his belly, becoming a human dolly | |
| 1924 | Actress Greta Garbo leaves Germany for Hollywood after filming a socially realistic picture The Joyless Street (director, G.W. Pabst) | ||
| July 18 | 1925 | Adolph Hitler publishes Mein Kampf, volume 1 | |
| 1925 | Adolf Hitler reorganizes the Nazi Party, which now has 27,000 members | ||
| 1925 | Ufa studio is deeply in debt. American studios, sensing an opportunity to cripple the studio that had become their major rival in Europe, offered to “help.” In 1925, MGM and Paramount proposed to cover UFA’s bank payment in exchange for the right to use UFA studios and to “borrow” UFA personnel for projects in the United States |
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| January 10 | 1926 | Erich Pommer leaves Ufa; in America, he joins Famous Players-Lasky Company, producing Hotel Imperial which stars Pola Negri | |
| 1926 | Director Michael Curtiz leaves Germany for Hollywood; he signs a long-term contract with Warner Brothers | ||
| 1926 | Director Josef von Sternberg goes to Hollywood as part of an agreement that provides money to Ufa | ||
| 1926 | Director F.W. Murnau goes to Hollywood to work for Fox studio | ||
| Summer | 1926 | Billy Wilder moves from Vienna to Berlin for a career in film | |
| January 10 | 1927 | Metropolis premieres in Berlin (Erich Pommer, producer; Fritz Lang, director; cinematographer, Eugen Schuefftan; cinematographer, Karl Freund; actress, Brigitte Helm) The picture is written by Lang and his wife Thea von Harbou. It is Adolf Hitler’s favorite movie | |
| March 6 | 1927 | Metropolis premieres in New York | |
| September 23 | 1927 | Sunrise premieres in the United States (director, F.W. Murnau; scenarist, Carl Mayer; art direction, E.G. Ulmer) | |
| October 6 | 1927 | The Jazz Singer premieres in the United States. It is a sound picture, and one of the first | |
| May 20 | 1928 | The Nazi Party wins 14 seats in the Reichstag | |
| November | 1928 | Joseph Goebbels takes over propaganda for the Nazi Party | |
| March 12 | 1929 | Asphalt premieres in Berlin (Erich Pommer, producer; Joe May, director.) With its stylized art direction and cinematography, and desperate characters, Asphalt sets the stage for film noir | |
| October | 1929 | Fred Zinneman leaves Europe for Hollywood at the age of 22 | |
| 1929 | Karl Freund leaves Germany for Hollywood | ||
| 1929 | Josef von Sternberg returns to Germany to direct The Blue Angel | ||
| December | 1929 | The Nazi Party now has 178,000 members | |
| January 9 | 1930 | Henry Blanke arrives in the United States on the SS Bremen | |
| January 30 | 1930 | Josef von Sternberg returns to Hollywood on the Bremen; The Blue Angel is denounced by Ufa management; the premiere is delayed | |
| February 4 | 1930 | People On Sunday premieres in Berlin (director, Robert Siodmak; writer Curt Siodmak; writer, Billy Wider; cinematographer, Eugen Schuefftan; assistant camera, Fred Zinneman; Edgar G. Ulmer) | |
| April 1 | 1930 | The Blue Angel premieres in Berlin (Erich Pommer, producer; Josef von Sternberg, director; Marlene Dietrich, actor; Emil Jannings, actor; Robert Liebmann, writer; Frederick Hollander, composer, Franz Waxman, orchestrator) The Blue Angel is Ufa’s first major sound picture | |
| April 1 | 1930 | Marlene Dietrich leaves Germany to work with von Sternberg in Hollywood immediately after premiere of The Blue Angel | |
| April 21 | 1930 | All Quiet on the Western Front premieres in the United States (Reiner Maria Remarque, director; Fred Zinnemann, extra) | |
| May 3 | 1930 | Asphalt premieres in New York | |
| September | 1930 | Nazi Party gains 107 seats from the Center in national elections, winning 18% of the vote | |
| December 4 | 1930 | All Quiet on the Western Front premieres in Berlin; the opening is sabotaged by Nazi sympathisers |
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| December 5 | 1930 | The Blue Angel premieres in New York | |
| December | 1930 | Unemployment in Germany reaches 4 million | |
| 1931 | The Nazi Party now is 800,000 strong; it is the second largest political party in Germany | ||
| February 12 | 1931 | Dracula premieres in the United States (Karl Freund, cinematographer) | |
| May 11 | 1931 | M premieres in Berlin (Seymour Nebenzal, producer; Fritz Lang, director; Peter Lorre, actor) M is Fritz Lang’s first talking picture, and introduced stage actor Peter Lorre to an international audience | |
| February 21 | 1932 | Murders In the Rue Morgue premieres in the United States (Karl Freund, cinematographer) | |
| July 31 | 1932 | The Nazi Party wins 230 seats in the Reichstag | |
| October 30 | 1932 | Actor Francis Lederer arrives in the United States on the SS Roma | |
| December 22 | 1932 | F.P. 1 Doesn’t Answer premieres in Berlin (Erich Pommer, producer; Walter Reisch, writer; Curt Siodmak, novel; Peter Lorre, actor) |
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| January 12 | 1933 | Director E.A. Dupont arrives in the United States at the invitation of Carl Laemmle (Universal Pictures) | |
| January 30 | 1933 | Adolf Hitler is appointed German Chancellor by the President of Germany. That night, his supporters celebrate with a torchlight parade down Unter den Linden | |
| January 30 | 1933 | Producer Erich Pommer secretly signs a deal with Fox-Europa Studios so he can leave Germany. | |
| February 22 | 1933 | Ich und die Kaiserin premieres in Berlin ( Erich Pommer, producer; Frederick Hollander, composer and director; Walter Reisch and Robert Leibman, writers; Franz Waxman, composer; Conrad Veidt, actor; Madys Christians, actor) |
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| February 27 | 1933 | Berlin’s Reichstag building burns in a suspicious fire. Billy Wilder decides it is time to leave Berlin. He heads to Paris | |
| March 12 | 1933 | The first concentration camp established at Oranienberg outside Berlin | |
| 1933 | Frederick Hollander leaves for Paris | ||
| 1933 | Franz Waxman is beaten up by Nazi thugs on his way home from work in Berlin; he leaves for Paris | ||
| 1933 | Joe May and his wife Mia leave for Paris. Mia May glues her “fake” jewels on the back of her pet turtle (in the fashion of the time) to sneak them out of the country | ||
| March 14 | 1933 | Josef Goebbels is named Minister for National Education and Propaganda | |
| March 20 | 1933 | A concentration camp is built at Dachau | |
| March 23 | 1933 | The German parliament passes Hitler’s Enabling Law. It suspends democracy and establishes Hitler’s power | |
| March 28 | 1933 | Joseph Goebbels sees The Last Testament of Dr. Mabuse (Fritz Lang, director) and decides to ban it | |
| March 28 | 1933 | At the Berlin Kaiserhof Hotel Goebbels says art must conform to certain society’s values | |
| March 28 | 1933 | Joseph Goebbels publishes an appeal to boycott all Jewish businesses | |
| March 29 | 1933 | The Ufa Board of Directors adopts a resolution to dismiss Jewish coworkers | |
| March/April | 1933 | Ufa cancels the contract of Erik Charell, director of hit movie The Congress Dances. In America, he will write Ziegfield Follies (1945) | |
| March/April | 1933 | Ufa cancels the contracts of writers Franz Schulz and Robert Adolf Stemme | |
| March/April | 1933 | Ufa cancels the contracts of writers Robert Liebmann and Hans Muller. Liebmann will die in a concentration camp | |
| March/April | 1933 | Ufa does not renew director Ludwig Berger’s contract. Berger will direct The Thief of Baghdad in 1940 for Alexander Korda |
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| 1933 | Composer Werner Richard Heymann, a pacifist, leaves Germany; Ufa tries to get the director of the Ufa orchestra to stay. He will not agree. The Nazis shoot the Heymann’s dog | ||
| By April | 1933 | Actors Elisabeth Bergner, Conrad Veidt, Fritz Kortner and Peter Lorre are already out of the country or preparing to leave Germany | |
| 1933 | Directors Hanns Schwarz, Wilhelm Thiele and Erik Charrell leave Germany | ||
| 1933 | Universal Pictures representative in Berlin, Paul Kohner, and his wife Lupita, smuggle money across the frontier to friends and former colleagues in Paris. On one such trip to Czechoslovakia, they are pulled from the train and searched. They do not return to Germany, but to Los Angeles |
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| April 1 | 1933 | Adolf Hitler orders a boycott of Jewish owned businesses | |
| April | 1933 | Conductor Otto Klemperer his family leave for America. His son Werner will become an actor in Hollywood | |
| April 4 | 1933 | Henry Koster leaves for Paris, having slugged a bank official in Berlin | |
| April 20 | 1933 | Fritz Lang and Thea Von Harbou dissolve their marriage | |
| April 26 | 1933 | Herman Goering forms the Gestapo | |
| April 30 | 1933 | Werner Richard Heymann arrives in the United States | |
| May 10 | 1933 | In Berlin and elsewhere, the books of Jewish authors are burned; by October, the purchase of works by Jewish authors will be considered an act of treason | |
| May | 1933 | Composer Frederick Hollander sails from France for America | |
| end of May | 1933 | Erich Pommer leaves Berlin for Paris. He is accompanied to the train by Ministry officials. Fearing deception, he leaves the train in Hannover, and crosses the border by car | |
| June 5 | 1933 | Frederick Hollander begins working in Hollywood | |
| 1933 | Cinematographer Eugen Schufftan leaves Germany; he will arrive in the United States in 1940 | ||
| 1933 | Bertholt Brecht leaves Germany for Denmark, then Paris, then Sweden. He will arrive in the United States in 1940 | ||
| 1933 | Conrad Veidt leaves Berlin for London. He will arrive in the United States in 1940 | ||
| 1933 | Fritz Lang leaves Berlin for Paris, where he directs Lilliom (Erich Pommer, producer; Fritz Lang, director; Robert Liebmann, writer; Franz Waxman, composer; Rudy Mate, cinematographer) | ||
| 1933 | Max Ophuls (born Max Oppenheimer) goes into exile in France. He will arrive in the United States in 1941 | ||
| 1933 | Actor Fritz Kortner leaves for England; he will later leave for the United States | ||
| 1933 | Director Sam Spiegel leaves Berlin for Paris | ||
| 1933 | Curt Siodmak leaves Berlin for England | ||
| 1933 | Robert Siodmak leaves Germany for Paris, then England. He will arrive in the United States in 1939 | ||
| 1933 | Actor Sig Arno leaves for America. He will work on Hollywood and on Broadway | ||
| 1933 | Director G.W. Pabst leaves Germany for France, then sails to the United States. Unhappy with the Hollywood movie industry, he returns to France. After several years, he wants to return to America. He travels to Austria to say goodbye to his mother. War breaks out and he must stay. He makes films in Germany | ||
| June 28 | 1933 | The Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda declares anyone who wants to participate in the production of German film must be of German descent and be a German citizen. | |
| August | 1933 | Actress Hedy Lamarr marries armaments dealer Fritz Mandl | |
| December 23 | 1933 | Viktor und Viktoria premieres in Berlin (Reinhold Schunzel, director) | |
| December | 1933 | Director Joe May, now in Hollywood, cables Billy Wilder that Columbia Pictures will buy his story Pam-Pam, pay him $150 to write screenplay, and pay for a one way ticket to Hollywood | |
| 1934 | Austrian composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold arrives in Hollywood to work with director Max Reinhardt on A Midsummer Night’s Dream | ||
| January 22 | 1934 | Billy Wilder buys a ticket on the Aquitania, an English vessel, in order to learn the language | |
| April 10 | 1934 | Erich Pommer arrives in the United States on the Ile de France | |
| April 27 | 1934 | Liliom released in Paris (Erich Pommer, producer; Fritz Lang, director, Franz Waxman, composer; Rudy Mate, cinematographer) | |
| 1934 | Fritz Lang receives an offer from David O Selznick to direct for MGM; he will arrive in the United States on June 12, 1934 | ||
| May 16 | 1934 | Franz Waxman leaves France on the Ile de France to finish the picture Music in the Air in Hollywood. He arrives in Los Angeles on May 26, and reports to work that day | |
| July 18 | 1934 | Peter Lorre boards the Majestic in Southampton and sails for New York. When he arrives six days later, the press will be waiting | |
| July 25 | 1934 | Austria’s Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss is assassinated | |
| August 2 | 1934 | German President Paul von Hindenburg dies; on August 19, Adolf Hitler becomes President and Chancellor of Germany | |
| December 13 | 1934 | Music in the Air premieres in the United States (Erich Pommer, producer; Joe May, director; Billy Wilder, writer; Franz Waxman, music director; Walter Reisch, assistant producer.) |
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| 1934 | Many of Adolph Hitler’s opponents are assassinated in Germany | ||
| 1934 | Curt Bois leaves Vienna for the New York stage; he will later go to Hollywood | ||
| 1934 | Franz Waxman is invited to a Christmas party at Salka Viertel’s home. There, he meets director Robert Wiene, who asks Waxman to score his new film, The Bride of Frankenstein |
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| January 8 | 1935 | Ecstasy is released in Germany (Gustav Machaty, director; Hedy Lamarr, actor) | |
| January 13 | 1935 | In a high voter turnout, the Saar plebiscite unites neutral Saarland with Germany | |
| April 22 | 1935 | The Bride of Frankenstein premieres in the United States | |
| 1935 | Henry Koster directs Affairs of Maupassant (Felix Jackson, writer; S.Z. Sakall, actor) in Vienna | ||
| May 3 | 1935 | The Black Cat premieres in the United States | |
| 1935 | Henry Koster shoots Katharina die Letzle (Joe Pasternak, producer; Felix Jackson, writer; Hans Salter, composer; Franceska Gaal, actor) in Budapest | ||
| July 12 | 1935 | Mad Love, a horror picture, premieres in the United States (Karl Freund, director; Peter Lorre, actor) | |
| September 15 | 1935 | Germany passes the “Nuremberg Laws”. They define anyone having three or four Jewish grandparents as being Jewish. The Laws revoke German citizenship to all Jews; they forbid sexual relations or marriage between Jews and those of German blood; they deprive Jews of most political rights. Soon the laws will be extended to include gypsies and other non-German groups | |
| November 11 | 1935 | A Night at the Opera premieres in the United States with music composed by Walter Jurmann and Bronislaw Kaper, who had been “discovered” in Paris by Louis B. Mayer a few months before, and brought to Hollywood on contract to MGM | |
| November 15 | 1935 | A Midsummer Night’s Dream is released (William Dieterle, director; Erich Wolfgang Korngold, composer (after Mendelssohn)) | |
| November 17 | 1935 | Franz Waxman takes over the music department at Universal | |
| 1935 | Frederick Hollander lands job as a staff composer at Paramount; the contract runs until 1940 | ||
| 1935 | Oskar Homolka leaves Germany for England; in 1937 he will sail for the United States, to work in Hollywood and on the New York stage | ||
| 1935 | Paul Henreid, having been offered a job at UFA in Berlin, refuses, as he would have had to join the Nazi Party. He returns to Austria and leaves for England. He will come to the United States after making Goodbye, Mr. Chips in London | ||
| February 10 | 1936 | Germany reoccupies the demilitarized (Versailles Treaty) industrial center, Rhineland. The occupation is met with no objection | |
| March 7 | 1936 | Dorothy Parker and Donald Ogden Stewart organize the Hollywood Anti-Nazi League. Fritz Lang, Ernst Lubitsch, and several thousand join the campaign. When Leni Riefenstahl arrives in Los Angeles to promote her film Olympiad, the League will mount a protest |
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| May 1 | 1936 | Italian forces take Ethiopia | |
| May 9 | 1936 | Fritz Lang’s first American picture, Fury premieres (Fritz Lang, director; Franz Waxman, composer) | |
| June 12 | 1936 | The Spanish Civil War begins | |
| July 18 | 1936 | Anthony Adverse premieres in Los Angeles. (Erich Wolfgang Korngold, composer.) The film wins the Academy Award for Best Scoring | |
| July 29 | 1936 | Olympic games begin in Berlin (Hitler removes the No Jews Allowed signs in the months before, then replaces them after Games) | |
| August 1 | 1936 | Hitler elected w/ 99% of the vote. All opposition parties have been disbanded by this time. Jews cannot vote. | |
| 1936 | Editor Rudi Fehr arrives in New York; he had been told that Germany would not be safe for him after the Olympics |
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| 1936 | Jews banned from working in the Austrian cinema and in the theater | ||
| 1936 | Three Smart Girls premieres in the United States. (Joseph Pasternak, producer; Henry Koster, director; Bronislau Kaper and Walter Jurmann, composers of the songs “My Heart is Singing,” and “Someone to Care for Me.” Three Smart Girls is a smash hit, and rescues Universal from financial ruin | ||
| Sept 10 – Oct 22 | 1936 | Mussolini and Hitler create the Berlin-Rome Axis | |
| November 1 | 1936 | Germany begins to build the Siegfried Line | |
| 1936 | Erich Wolfgang Korngold receives the Academy Award for Best Scoring for Anthony Adverse | ||
| 1937 | Principal photography begins on One Hundred Men and A Girl (Joe Pasternak, producer; Henry Koster, director; Frederick Hollander, composer) | ||
| May 15 – July 24 | 1937 | A concentration camp built at Buchenwald | |
| July 25 | 1937 | Writer Curt Siodmak arrives in Hollywood from London. | |
| August 19 | 1937 | Composer Hans J. Salter arrives in the United States on the SS Statendam | |
| October 16 | 1937 | Reinhold Schunzel arrives in the USA; returns to Germany in 1953 | |
| December 8 | 1937 | La Habanera premieres in Berlin (Douglas Sirk, director) Douglas Sirk has remained in Germany to advance his career, despite having a Jewish wife | |
| December 18 | 1937 | Douglas Sirk (Detlef Sierck) slips out of Germany with Jewish wife Hilde Jary; in 1941 he begins directing in Hollywood as Doug Sirk | |
| 1937 | Actor Paul Andor, having become involved in German politics, leaves. Ernst Lubitsch will him work. In America, Paul Andor performs as John Voight to protect his father, still in Germany | ||
| 1937 | Actor Hedy Lamarr leaves her husband and her home in Vienna in the dead of night. She takes the train to Paris. There, she will accept an offer from MGM, and sail to America | ||
| 1937 | Cinematographer Franz Planer leaves Austria for the United States | ||
| 1937 | Karl Freund receives Academy Award for Best Cinematraphy for The Good Earth; Luise Rainer receives Academy Award for Best Actress for The Good Earth; Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music for Lost Horizon; Frederick Hollander receives nomination for Best Song for Artists and Models; One Hundred Men and A Girl is nominated for Best Picture; William Dieterle is nominated for Best Director for The Life of Emile Zola | ||
| January | 1938 | Warner Brothers asks Erich Wolfgang Korngold to score The Adventures of Robin Hood. Korngold leaves Vienna for Hollywood with his wife and one of his sons. He screens the picture, and tells Warner Brothers he does not want to write the music. He will return to Vienna with his family | |
| January 29 | 1938 | Hitler orders troops into Austria | |
| 1938 | Erich Wolfgang Korngold does not return to Austria. After making sure that his son can get to safety in Switzerland, he writes the score for Robin Hood | ||
| March 12 | 1938 | Austria is declared part of German Reich | |
| March 13 | 1938 | The Adventures of Robin Hood premieres in Los Angeles. Erich Wolfgang Korngold receives the Academy Award for best original score | |
| April 25 | 1938 | Actor Felix Bressart arrives in the United States | |
| July 11 | 1938 | Hitler orders the mobilization of the German Army | |
| September 29-30 | 1938 | British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlin signs Munich Agreement. Germany will take control of Czechoslovakia | |
| September | 1938 | Germany begins stamping passports of German Jews with a “J” | |
| October | 1938 | Composer Ernest Goldner (Gold) leaves Austria for the United States | |
| October 15 | 1938 | Germany invades Sudentenland; Joachim von Ribbentrop is named Foreign Minister | |
| November 9 | 1938 | Kristallnacht (the Night of Broken Glass) takes place in Germany; 7500 Jewish businesses are destroyed | |
| November 9 | 1938 | All Jewish businesses ordered to cease business by this date | |
| November 12 | 1938 | Actor John Mylong-Muenz arrives in the United States | |
| November 19 | 1938 | Aspiring Austrian diplomat Helmut Dantine arrives in the United States from Vienna. He had been put into a concentration camp for anti-Hitler activism. His parents arranged for his rescue, and sent him to Los Angeles, where he became an actor | |
| December 23 | 1938 | The Siegfried Line of defensive tanks and forts is constructed by Germany along its western frontier | |
| 1938 | The European Film Fund is created to assist arriving emigres. Ernst Lubitsch, Charlotte and William Dieterle, Paul and Lupita Kohner are among the many who actively support the European Film Fund. Anyone who had a job was asked to pledge 1% of his or ear earnings to the emergency fund | ||
| 1938 | The House Un-American Activities Commitee announces that it will hold hearings about alleged communist influences in Hollywood | ||
| 1938 | Actor Ludwig Stoessel, having been imprisoned several times in Austria, escapes | ||
| 1938 | Erich Wolfgang Korngold receives the Academy Award for Best Music for The Adventures of Robin Hood; Franz Waxman is nominated for Best Music and Best Scoring for The Young At Heart | ||
| 1939 | Franz Waxman and Billy Wilder become American citizens | ||
| 1939 | Hedy Lamarr becomes an American citizen | ||
| January 22 | 1939 | Actor Sig Arno arrives in the United States | |
| February 16 | 1939 | Actor Louis V. Arco (Louis Altschul) arrives in the United States | |
| March 15 | 1939 | Germany invades Czechoslovakia | |
| April | 1939 | The Republicans surrender to General Franco, ending the Spanish Civil War | |
| April 27 | 1939 | The anti-Nazi picture Confessions of a Nazi Spy premieres in Los Angeles (Anatole Litwak, director; Francis Lederer, actor). Fifteen exiles appeared in this anti-Nazi picture, the firs film to openly warn of the Nazi menace. Subsequent to the studio’s press conference announcing the picture, Groucho Marx saluted Warner Brothers as ‘the only studio with any guts.” | |
| June | 1939 | Marlene Dietrich becomes American citizen | |
| August | 1939 | Ufa’s distribution managers order that new productions now be supplied with Polish subtitles | |
| August 25 | 1939 | Britain and Poland sign a Mutual Assistance Treaty | |
| August 31 | 1939 | The British fleet mobilizes; civilian evacuations begin from London | |
| September 1 | 1939 | Germany invades Poland and terminates its non-aggression pact with Russia | |
| September 1 | 1939 | The Hunchback of Notre Dame opens the Cannes Film Festival. The Festival closes the very same day, as word arrives of Germany’s aggression (William Dieterle, director; Bruno Frank, adaptation) | |
| September 2 | 1939 | Marlene Dietrich is one of many Americans stranded in Europe. At the last minute, she gets passage back to the United States on the Queen Mary. Writer Salka Viertel has returned the the United States the day before | |
| September 2 | 1939 | The German ship Bremen leaves New York harbor in dead of night, heading back to Germany, empty, save for the crew. | |
| September 3 | 1939 | Britain, France, Australia and New Zealand declare war on Germany | |
| September 5 | 1939 | The United States declares neutrality | |
| September 27 | 1939 | Poland surrenders to Germany | |
| October 3 | 1939 | Ludwig Stoessel arrives in Hollywood from London | |
| October 6 | 1939 | Ninotchka premieres in Hollywood. Ernst Lubitsch has hired his former colleagues and countrymen on the picture (Ernst Lubitsch, director; Billy Wilder, writer; Walter Reisch, writer; Werner Richard Heymann, composer; Greta Garbo, actor, Sig Ruman, Actor, Alexander Granach, actor, Paul Andor, actor.) Six cast members are emigres | |
| December 29 | 1939 | Destry Rides Again premieres in the United States. (Joseph Pasternak, producer; Marlene Dietrich, actor; Frederick Hollander, composer) | |
| 1939 | Albert Basserman, one of Germany’s most esteemed actors, leaves for Hollywood. He is 72 years old, and speaks no English | ||
| 1939 | Erich Wolfgang Korngold is nominated for Best Scoring for The Private Lives of Elisabeth and Essex; Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Scoring for Mr. Smith Goes to Washington; Felix Jackson is nominated for Original Story for Bachelor Mother; Walter Reisch and Billy Wilder are nominated for Original Story for Ninotchka | ||
| February 19 | 1940 | Austrian actor Ludwig Donath arrives in the United States | |
| April 9 | 1940 | The horror picture The Invisible Man Returns premieres (Joe May, director; Curt Siodmak, writer; Hans J. Salter, composer) | |
| May 10 | 1940 | Germany invades rance, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands; in England, Winston Churchill becomes Prime Minister | |
| May 15 | 1940 | Holland surrenders to the Germans | |
| May 28 | 1940 | Hbelgium surrenders to the Germans | |
| June 3 | 1940 | Germans bomb Paris | |
| June 10 | 1940 | Norway surrenders to the Nazis; Italy declares war on Britain and France | |
| June 13 | 1940 | Robert Siodmak leaves Paris one day before the Germans arrive | |
| June 14 | 1940 | Germans enter Paris | |
| June 22 | 1940 | France signs an armistice with the Nazis | |
| June 23 | 1940 | Hitler tours Paris | |
| June 28 | 1940 | Great Britain recognizes Charles deGaulle as leader of the Free French | |
| July 10 | 1940 | The Battle of Britain begins | |
| 1940 | William Dieterle pays $10,000 to German government for the release of actors Jacob and Louise Fleck (he Jewish) from Dachau and Buchenwald. They emigrate to Shanghai | ||
| August 17 | 1940 | Germany declares a blockade of British Isles | |
| September 7 | 1940 | German blitzagainst England begins | |
| September 16 | 1940 | American conscription begins | |
| November 5 | 1940 | President Franklin Roosevelt re-elected | |
| December 27 | 1940 | The horror picture The Invisible Woman premieres (Joe May, writer; Curt Siodmak, writer) | |
| 1940 | Rudolph Mate is nominated for Best Cinematography for Foreign Correspondent; Albert Basserman is nominated for Best Actor in a Supporting Role in Foreign Correspondent; Franz Waxman is nominated for Best Music for Rebecca; Werner Richard Heymann is nominated for Best Music for One Million BC; Erich Wolfgang Korngold is nominated for Best Scoring for The Sea Hawk; Walter Reisch is nominated for Original Story for Comrade X | ||
| June 22 | 1941 | Germany invades Soviet Union | |
| July 31 | 1941 | Hermann Goring orders Reinhard Heydrich to prepare the “Final Solution” | |
| August 14 | 1941 | Great Britain and the United States announce the Atlantic Charter | |
| August 20 | 1941 | The German siege of Leningrad begins | |
| September 1 | 1941 | Jews are required to wear a yellow star | |
| September 3 | 1941 | First experimental use of gas chambers at Auschwitz | |
| September 19 | 1941 | The German Army takes Kiev | |
| September 29 | 1941 | The Nazis murder 33,771 Jews at Kiev | |
| October 23 | 1941 | Heinrich Himmler orders a ban on Jewish emigration from German occupied areas | |
| October | 1941 | Germany begins the mass deportations of Jews | |
| October 30 | 1941 | The German Army reaches Sevastopol | |
| November 15 | 1941 | Forced labor camp created at Treblinka, Poland | |
| December 7 | 1941 | The Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor | |
| December 8 | 1941 | The United States and Britain declare war on Japan | |
| December 10 | 1941 | Germany declares war on the United States | |
| December 12 | 1941 | The horror picture The Wolf-Man premieres in the United States (Curt Siodmak, writer) It quietly warns of the Nazi menace | |
| 1941 | Peter Lorre becomes American citizen | ||
| 1941 | Karl Freund is nominated for Best Cinemotography for The Chocolate Soldier; Rudolph Mate is nominated for Best Cinematography for That Hamilton Woman; Karl Freund is nominated for Best Cinematography for Blossoms in the Dust; Werner Richard Heymann is nominated for Best Music for That Uncertain Feeling; Franz Waxman is nominated for Best Music for Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde and for Best Music for Suspicion; Miklos Rozsa is nominated for Best Music for Lydia; Billy Wilder is nominated for Original Story for Ball of Fire | ||
| January 20 | 1942 | Reinhold Heydrich holds Wansee Conference to discuss “Final Solution” | |
| March 6 | 1942 | The anti-Nazi film To Be or Not To Be premieres in Los Angeles (Ernst Lubitsch, director; Werner Richard Heymann, composer; Rudolph Mate, cinematographer; Sig Ruman,actor; Felix Bressart, actor; Alexander Granach, actor) The cast includes nine émigré actors. The picture wrapped production on December 23, 1941 — two weeks after Pearl Harbor — and was released in March 1942. The public did respond well to the comedy, now that America was at war | |
| April 23 | 1942 | German air raids begin over cathedral cities in Britain | |
| May 3 | 1942 | Deportations from central Poland begin to the Sobibor killing camp. They continue thru November 1943 and include the residents of dismantled Jewish ghettos | |
| May 8 | 1942 | The German summer offensive begins in the Crimea | |
| May 16 | 1942 | German field marshal Erwin Rommel begins offensive against Gazala Line in Africa | |
| May 21 | 1942 | Tortilla Flat premieres (Hedy Lamarr, actress; Karl Freund, cinematographer; Franz Waxman, composer) | |
| May 27 | 1942 | SS Leader Reinhold Heydrich is attacked in Prague | |
| May 25 | 1942 | Production starts on the anti-Nazi picture Casablanca | |
| June | 1942 | The mass gassing of Jews begins in Auschwitz | |
| June 10 | 1942 | The Nazis liquidate Lidice, Poland in reprisal for Heydrich’s assassination | |
| June 30 | 1942 | Rommel reaches El Alamein near Cairo, Egypt | |
| July 9 | 1942 | The German Army begins drive toward Stalingrad | |
| July 22 | 1942 | First deportations from the Warsaw Ghetto to concentration camps; Treblinka extermination camp opened | |
| August 17 | 1942 | The anti-Nazi picture Berlin Correspondent premieres. The cast includes 12 émigré actors | |
| 1942 | All German film production is now incorporated in UFA | ||
| September | 1942 | Fred Zinneman’s father is killed | |
| September 13 | 1942 | The Battle of Stalingrad begins. The battle will last until 2 February 1943 | |
| November 11 | 1942 | The Germans and Italians invade unoccupied Vichy France | |
| November 27 | 1942 | Casablanca premieres in New York (Michael Curtiz, director; Henry Blanke, associate producer; Max Steiner, composer; Peter Lorre, actor; Conrad Veidt, actor; S.Z. Sakall, actor; Helmut Dantine, Marcel Dalio, actor; Curt Bois, actor; Trude Berliner, actor; Louis V. Arco, ctor;actor; Madeleine LeBeau, actor; Leonid Kinsky, actor; Ilke Gruening, actor; Lotte Palfi, actor; Ludwig Stossel, actor; Hans von Twardowski, actor; Wolfgang Zilzer, actor) The cast included 17 emigre actors | |
| December 2 | 1942 | Professor Enrico Fermi sets up an atomic reactor in Chicago | |
| December 13 | 1942 | Rommel withdraws from El Agheila | |
| December 17 | 1942 | British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden tells the British House of Commons of mass executions of Jews by Nazis; U.S. declares those crimes will be avenged | |
| 1942 | Rudolph Mate is nominated for Best Cinematography for The Pride of the Yankees; Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music for The Corsican Brothers; Werner Richard Heymann is nominated for Best Music for To Be or Not To Be; Miklos Rozsa is nominated for Best Music for The Jungle Book; Frederick Hollander is nominated for Best Music for Talk of the Town; Hans J. Salter is nominated for Best Scoring for It Started With Eve | ||
| 1943 | Conrad Veidt dies at age 50 | ||
| January 10 | 1943 | The Soviets begin an offensive against the Germans in Stalingrad | |
| January 12 – 14 | 1943 | Casablanca conference between Churchill and Roosevelt. Roosevelt announces the war can end only with an unconditional German surrender | |
| February 2 | 1943 | The German surrender at Stalingrad is the first big defeat of German forces | |
| March 23 | 1943 | The anti-Nazi film Hangmen Also Die premieres (Fritz Lang, director; Bertholt Brecht and Fritz Lang, writers; Hans Eisler, composer; Lang; writers, Lang and Brecht; composer, Eisler; Hans von Twardowski, actor) The cast includes ten émigré actors | |
| April 21 | 1943 | The horror picture I Walked With A Zombie premieres (Curt Siodmak, writer) | |
| May 13 | 1943 | German and Italian troops surrender in North Africa | |
| June 10 | 1943 | The anti-Nazi picture Hitler’s Madman premieres (Seymour Nebenzahl, producer; Doug Sirk) The cast included six émigré actors | |
| June 11 | 1943 | Himmler orders the liquidation of all Jewish ghettos in Poland | |
| June | 1943 | Belzec extermination camp, responsible for exterminating Jews from Southern Poland ghettos is dismantled. Bodies exhumed and burned; forced laborers either shot or sent to Sobibor to be gassed. German plow over and cover as farm with crops and manor house. | |
| July | 1943 | Treblinka II killing camp operations are suspended; prisoners are returned to Treblinka l forced labor camp | |
| September | 1943 | Fred Zinnemann’s mother is killed | |
| September 8 | 1943 | The Italian surrender is announced | |
| September 19 | 1943 | The anti-Nazi picture The Strange Death of Adolf Hitler premieres in Los Angeles (Joe May and Fritz Kortner, writers) The picture includes 18 émigré actors | |
| December 31 | 1943 | Marlene Dietrich puts her silverware, clothing, furniture, jewels and European porcelain up for auction to pay her family expenses while she goes off to war | |
| 1943 | Casablanca receives the Academy Award for Best Picture; Michael Curtiz receives the Academy Award for Best Director for Casablanca. Rudolph Mate is nominated for Best Cinematography for Sahara; Hans J. Salter is nominated for Best Music in The Amazing Mrs. Holliday; Hans Eisler is nominated for Best Music for Hangmen Also Die; Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music for Moon and Sixpence; Hans Dreier is nominated for Art Direction for Five Graves to Cairo and for Art Direction for For Whom the Bell Tolls; Ernst Lubitsch is nominated for Best Directing for Heaven Can Wait | ||
| January | 1944 | Marlene Dietrich goes to New York to prepare her USO act with Danny Thomas and others. They rehearse in a shabby rehearsal hall above Lindy’s, off-Broadway | |
| January 17 | 1944 | First attack towards Casino, Italy | |
| January 22 | 1944 | The Allies land at Anzio | |
| January 27 | 1944 | Leningrad is relieved after a 900-day siege | |
| January 28 | 1944 | The film noir picture Phantom Lady premieres (Robert Siodmak, director; Hans J. Salter, music director) Hollywood is increasingly making taut thrillers and gritty stories of crime or detection characterized by their distinctive lighting, murky atmospherics, and themes of alienation and despair. Nearly every emigre will have at least one film noir credit to his or her name | |
| April 11 | 1944 | Marlene Dietrich presents her first overseas performaance for the troops at Algiers Opera House | |
| April 26 | 1944 | The anti-Nazi picture Hitler Gang premieres. The film includes 30 émigré actors | |
| May 25 | 1944 | Germans retreat from Anzio as Allies move forward in Italy. | |
| June 6 | 1944 | D-Day. The Allies land on the French Coast | |
| June 6 | 1944 | Marlene Dietrich announces Allied landings at Normandy Beach to USO in North Africa | |
| June | 1944 | Marlene Dietrich and her troupe are ordered back to New York. Dietrich records popular American songs with German lyrics for “Operation Musac”, a dummy corporation set up by the Office of Strategic Services. The Allies beamed the soft propaganda recordings across the English Channel into Europe and unsuspecting German audiences | |
| July 14 | 1944 | Last killings take place at Chelmo extermination camp; camp is dismantled | |
| July 18 | 1944 | U.S. troops reach St. Lo | |
| July 23 | 1944 | Russians liberate Majdanek extermination camp; between 95,000 and 130,000 have been killed there | |
| end July | 1944 | Soviet troops overrun the site of the labor camp and killing center at Treblinka II | |
| August 25 | 1944 | Paris is liberated. Marlene Dietrich and her troupe return to Europe | |
| Sept 1-4 | 1944 | Verdun, Dieppe, Artois, Rouen, Abbeville, Antwerp and Brussels are liberated by the Allies | |
| Sept 6 | 1944 | The film noir picture Double Indemnity premieres (Billy Wilder, director; Billy Wilder, co-writer; Miklos Rozsa, composer) | |
| September | 1944 | American reporters visit the abandoned Majdanek and Lublin camps. Find warehouse w/ 800,000 shoes | |
| October 11 | 1944 | The film noir picture Laura premieres. (Otto Preminger, director) | |
| October 16 | 1944 | The film noir picture Ministry of Fear premieres (Fritz Lang, director; Miklos Rozsa, composer (uncredited); Hans Dreier, art direction) | |
| October 21 | 1944 | Massive German surrender at Aachen | |
| October 30 | 1944 | Last use of gas chambers at Auschwitz | |
| November 24 | 1944 | French capture Strasbourg | |
| December 16-27 | 1944 | Battle of the Bulge in the Ardennes | |
| Christmas | 1944 | Marlene Dietrich entertains troops of the 99th Army near Bastogne at center of Battle of the Bulge | |
| 1944 | Rudolph Mate is nominated for Best Cinematography for Cover Girl; Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music for The Bridge of San Luis Rey and for Best Music for Woman of the Town; Hans Eisler is nominatd for Best Music for None But the Lonely Heart; Miklos Rozsa is nominated for Best Music for Double Indemnity; Hans J. Salter is nominated for Best Music for Christmas Holiday and for Best Scoring for The Merry Monahans; Werner Richard Heymann is nominated for Best Scoring for Knickerbocker Holiday; Billy Wilder is nominated for Best Writing for Double Indemnity; Double Indemnity is nominated for Best Picture; Walter Reisch is nominated for Best Writing for Gaslight |
||
| Winter | 1944-1945 | Marlene Dietrich is on front lines and at border of Germany. In late winter she is sent back to Paris, to recover from a second bout of pneumonia, plus frostbite | |
| January 17 | 1945 | Soviet troops capture Warsaw | |
| January 25 | 1945 | The film noir picture The Woman in the Window premieres (Fritz Lang, director) | |
| January 26 | 1945 | Soviet troops liberate Auschwitz | |
| Jan – April | 1945 | Battle of Germany | |
| February 4 – 11 | 1945 | Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin meet at Yalta | |
| March 2 | 1945 | The anti-Nazi picture Hotel Berlin premieres. (Vicki Baum, writer; Franz Waxman, original music; Peter Lorre, actor) The cast includes nine émigré actors | |
| April 5 | 1945 | Americans discover camps at Ohrdruf | |
| April 11 | 1945 | American troops liberate Buchenwald concentration camp | |
| April 12 | 1945 | Death of Frankin D. Roosevelt; Harry S. Truman becomes President | |
| April 15 | 1945 | British troops liberate Bergen-Belsen concentration camp | |
| April 16 | 1945 | Soviet troops begin their final attack on Berlin; Americans enter Nuremberg | |
| April 21 | 1945 | The Russians reach Berlin | |
| April 22 | 1945 | The Russians liberate Saschenhausen | |
| April 29 | 1945 | The American army liberates Dachau | |
| April 30 | 1945 | Adolf Hitler commits suicide | |
| April 30 | 1945 | The Russians arrive in center of Berlin after a battle for Berlin of several weeks | |
| May | 1945 | Billy Wilder travels to London to screen documentary footage of death camps | |
| May 1 | 1945 | Death of Hitler is announced | |
| May 7 | 1945 | German troops surrender to the Allies | |
| May 8 | 1945 | Victory-in-Europe Day | |
| May 8 | 1945 | Marlene Dietrich, with American troops in Bavaria, requests permission to fraternize with the French troops and kisses Jean Gabin on VE Day | |
| June 5 | 1945 | Allies control Berlin and divide Germany | |
| June 28 | 1945 | Marlene Dietrich writes to Lucius Clay (Deupty Military Governor) asking for permission to go to Berlin | |
| July 8 | 1945 | Lucius D. Clay writes to Marlene denying her request to go to Berlin, but informs her she can go at the end of the month. He asks for her mother’s address so he can ascertain her condition | |
| July 13 | 1945 | Marlene Dietrich is returned to USA with a jaw infection. She is, her agent tells her, broke, and cannot afford her hotel | |
| July 16 | 1945 | First U.S. atomic bomb test; Potsdam Conference begins | |
| July/August | 1945 | Billy Wilder begins work on a documentary Death Mills about the concentration camps in Germany. Wilder lost three-quarters of his family in Auschwitz. Every émigré lost friends, or family or both | |
| August 6 | 1945 | First atomic bomb dropped, on Hiroshima, Japan | |
| August 9 | 1945 | Second atomic bomb dropped, on Nagasaki, Japan | |
| August 14 | 1945 | The Japanese agree to an unconditional surrender | |
| September 2 | 1945 | The Japanese sign the surrender agreement; V-J (Victory over Japan) Day | |
| September 19-23 | 1945 | Marlene Dietrich is given permission to visit Berlin as a member of the Special Service | |
| October 31 | 1945 | Alfred Hitchcock’s picture Spellbound premieres (Mikos Rozsa, composer) Rozsa receives the Academy Award for Best Music | |
| November 16 | 1945 | The Lost Weekend premieres (Billy Wilder, director; Miklos Rozsa, composer) | |
| November 20 | 1945 | The Nuremberg war crimes trials begin | |
| November 30 | 1945 | The film noir picture Detour premieres (Edgar G. Ulmer, director) | |
| December 25 | 1945 | Humoresque premieres (Rudi Fehr, editor; Franz Waxman, additional music) | |
| 1945 | Joe May quits the film business. He and his wife open a Viennese restaurant. His colleagues support the restaurant, but it fails | ||
| 1945 | Billy Wilder receives the Academy Award for Best Directing and for Best Writing for The Lost Weekend; The Lost Weekend receives an Academy Award for Best Picture. Hans Dreier receives the Academy Award for Art Direction for Frenchman’s Creek. Miklos Rozsa is nominated for Best Music for The Lost Weekend and for Best Music for A Song To Remember and for Best Music for Spellbound; Hans J. Salter is nominated for Best Music for This Love of Ours. Hans Dreier is nominated for Art Direction for Love Letters | ||
| August 28 | 1946 | The film noir picture The Killers premieres (Robert Siodmak, director; Miklos Rozsa, composer) | |
| December 13 | 1946 | Actor S.Z. Sakall and his wife Bozsi become American citizens. They keep their framed certificates on the mantelpiece | |
| December 25 | 1946 | The horror (and anti-Nazi) film The Beast With Five Fingers premieres (Curt Siodmak, writer) | |
| 1946 | Hollywood has the most profitable year of the entire decade. Audiences flock to Humoresque, It’s A Wonderful Life, Notorious, The Killers, and The Best Years of Our Lives | ||
| 1946 | Erich Pommer returns to Germany as an officer in the U.S. army, charged with supervising the licensing of the first production companies in the post-Nazi film industry | ||
| 1946 | Robert Siodmak is nominated for Best Directing for The Killers; Franz Waxman is nominated for Best Music for Humoresque; Miklos Rozsa is nominated for Best Music for The Killers | ||
| 1947 | Beginning a search to find Communists in the Screenwriters Guild, the House Un-American Activities Committee holds hearings in Washington. Actor Paul Henried joins Humphrey Bogart and others to demonstrate their support for the writers known as the “Hollywood Ten.” | ||
| 1947 | The Best Years of Our Lives sweeps the Oscars | ||
| November 24 | 1947 | Hollywood studio executives, having met for two days in secret, announce they will blacklist the “Hollywood Ten” and will not knowingly hire a Communist or anyone with Communist sympathies | |
| November 30 | 1947 | Director Ernst Lubitsch dies of a heart attack at age 55 | |
| 1947 | Henry Koster is nominated for Best Directing for The Bishop’s Wife; Miklos Rozsa is nominated for Best Music for A Double Life | ||
| March 28 | 1948 | The Search premieres (Fred Zinnemann, director) | |
| May 4 | 1948 | The Supreme Court decision in United States v. Paramount Pictures finds the sutdios in volation of anti-trust legislation by block-booking their pictures. The decision results in the separation of studios from the theaters, and will have an impact on the number of pictures that are made | |
| June 30 | 1948 | A Foreign Affair premieres (Billy Wilder, director; Billy Wilder, co-writer; Frederick Hollander, composer; Marlene Dietrich, actor) Shot on location in Berlin two years after the war, it is Billy Wilder’s most personal film | |
| July 16 | 1948 | John Huston’s film noir picture Key Largo premieres (Karl Freund, cinematographer; Max Steiner, composer; Rudi Fehr, editor) | |
| December 21 | 1948 | The film noir picture Act of Violence premieres (Fred Zinemann, director, Bronislau Kaper, composer) | |
| 1948 | Fred Zinnemann is nominated for Best Directing for The Search; Frederick Hollander is nominated for Best Song for That Woman in Ermine; Billy Wilder is nominated for Best Writing for A Foreign Affair; Oscar Homolka is nominated for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for I Remember Mama | ||
| January 12 | 1949 | The film noir picture Criss Cross premieres (Robert Siodmak, director; Miklos Rozsa, composer; Franz Planer, cinematographer) | |
| 1949 | Franz Planer is nominated for Best Cinematography for Champion; Miklos Rozsa is nominated for Best Music for Champion | ||
| 1950 | 1950 is the first year that German is “open” to civilians | ||
| April 30 | 1950 | The film noir picture D.O.A. premieres (Rudy Mate, director; Dmitri Tiomkin, composer) | |
| August 4 | 1950 | The film noir picture Sunset Boulevard premieres (Billy Wilder, director; Bily Wilder, co-writer; Franz Waxman, composer; Hans Dreier, art direction) The pictures wins Oscars for Best Art Direction, Best Music and Best Writing | |
| October 13 | 1950 | Harvey premieres (Henry Koster, director) | |
| 1950 | Billy Wilder receives the Academy Award for Best Writing for Sunset Boulevard; Franz Waxman receives the Academy Award for Best Music for Sunset Boulevard. Billy Wilder is nominated for Best Directing for Sunset Boulevard; Hans Dreier is nominated for Best Art Direction for Sunset Boulevard | ||
| August 14 | 1951 | George Stevens’ A Place in the Sun premieres. (Franz Waxman, composer; Hans Dreier, art direction) The picture wins the Oscar for Best Musical Score | |
| September 7 | 1951 | The film noir picture Der Verlorene (The Lost One) premieres in Germany. (Peter Lorre, director) The picture fails at the box office; Lorre returns to the United States, having hoped for a directorial career back in Berlin | |
| 1951 | Composer Werner Richard Heymann returns to Germany | ||
| 1951 | Actor Ilke Gruening returns to Germany. She will come back to the United States; her professional life in Germany is unsatisfactory | ||
| 1951 | Director Robert Siodmak leaves Hollywood for Paris. His career has been slowed by the disintegrating studio system, which in turn has been affected by the arrival of television | ||
| 1951 | Franz Waxman receives the Academy Award for Best Music for A Place in the Sun. Franz Planer is nominated for Best Cinematography for Death of A Salesman; Fred Zinneman is nominated for Best Documentary for Benjy; Miklos Rozsa is nominated for Best Music for Quo Vadis; Billy Wilder is nominated for Best Writing for The Big Carnival | ||
| 1951-1954 | Between 1951 and 1953, the House Un-American Activities Committee again focuses on Hollywood. The Hollywood studios create blacklists of individuals who they will not hire, for alleged Communist associations. Still more are “grey-listed” as being suspect. Paul Henreid is among this number, as is Fritz Lang. Fritz Lang’s lawyer writes an apology for Lang’s involvement in the Anti-Nazi League, which was allegedly a Communist front. | ||
| 1947-1954 | Hollywood makes almost 40 explicitly anti-Communist pictures. None of them make any money. | ||
| 1951 – | Television series I Love Lucy (Karl Freund, cinematographer) Karl Freund developed the three camera technique used to shoot television situation comedies | ||
| 1952-1956 | Television series, Our Miss Brooks (Karl Freund, cinematographer) | ||
| July 30 | 1952 | The western High Noon premieres. (Fred Zinnemann, director; Dmitri Tiomkin, composer) | |
| 1952 | Miklos Rozsa receives an Academy Award for Best Music for High Noon. Fred Zinneman is nominated for Best Directing for High Noon; High Noon is nominated for Best Picture. Miklos Rozsa is nominated for Best Music for Ivanhoe | ||
| March 10 | 1953 | Charles Walter’s Lili premieres (Bronislau Kaper, composer) The picture wins the Academy Award for Best Musical Score | |
| August 5 | 1953 | From Here to Eternity premieres. (Fred Zinnemann, director) The picture wins the Academy Award for Best Director | |
| October 14 | 1953 | The film noir picture The Big Heat premieres (Fritz Lang, director) | |
| 1953 | Walter Reisch receives an Academy Award for Best Writing for Titanic. Fred Zinneman receives an Academy Award for Best Directing for From Here to Eternity; From Here to Eternity is nominated for Best Picture. Billy Wilder is nominated for Best Directing for Stalag 17; Bronislau Kaper is nominated for Best Music for Lili; Miklos Rozsa is nominated for Best Music for Julius Caesar; Frederick Hollander is nominated for Best Music for The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T | ||
| September 22 | 1953 | Sabrina premieres (Billy Wilder, director; Billy Wilder, co-writer; Frederick Hollander, composer; Marcel Dalio, actor) | |
| April 29 | 1954 | Joe May dies at age 73 | |
| May 17 | 1954 | Supreme Court announces their unanimous decision in Brown v. Board of Education | |
| August 4 | 1954 | Magnificent Obsession premieres (Douglas Sirk, director) Douglas Sirk takes the melodrama and uses it for social commentary. These critiques of American society and ideology were not seen as such at the time and are Universal Picture’s biggest box office hits of the decade | |
| 1954 | Billy Wilder is nominated for Best Directing for Sabrina; Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music for The High and Mighty; Franz Waxman is nominated for Best Music for The Silver Chalice; Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Song for The High and Mighty; Billy Wilder is nominated for Best Writing for Sabrina; Max Ophuls is nominated for Best Art Direction for Le Plaisir | ||
| 1955 | S.Z. Sakall dies at age 71 | ||
| December | 1955 | All That Heaven Allows premieres (Douglas Sirk, director) | |
| December | 1956 | Written on the Wind premieres (Douglas Sirk, director) | |
| 1956 | Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music for Giant | ||
| 1957 | Erich Wolfgang Korngold dies at age 60 | ||
| 1957 | Billy Wilder is nominated for Best Directing for Witness for The Prosecution; Witness for the Prosecution is nominated for Best Picture. Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music for Wild Is The Wind | ||
| 1958 | Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music for The Old Man and the Sea | ||
| March 29 | 1959 | Some Like It Hot premieres (Billy Wilder, director; Billy Wilder, co-writer) | |
| April 30 | 1959 | Imitation of Life premieres (Douglas Sirk, director) | |
| 1959 | Miklos Rozsa receives an Academy Award for Best Music for Ben Hur. Franz Planer is nominated for Best Cinematography for The Nun’s Story; Fred Zinnemann is nominated for Best Director for The Nun’s Story; Franz Waxman is nominated for Best Music for The Nun’s Story; Billy Wilder is nominated for Best Directing for Some Like It Hot; Ernest Gold is nominated for Best Music for On The Beach; Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Song for Strange Are the Ways of Love | ||
| June 15 | 1960 | The Apartment premieres (Billy Wilder, dorector; Billy Wilder, co-writer) | |
| December 15 | 1960 | Otto Preminger’s Exodus premieres (Ernest Gold, composer) The picture won Best Musical Score at the Academy Awards | |
| 1960 | Billy Wilder receives Best Director Academy Award for The Apartment; The Apartment receives Best Picture Academy Award. Billy Wilder is nominated for Best Writer for The Apartment. Jules Dassin is nominated for Best Director for Never on Sunday; Fred Zinnemann is nominated for Best Director for The Sundowners; The Sundowners is nominated for Best Picture. Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music and for Best Song for The Alamo; Ernest Gold is nominated for Best Music for Exodus; Alexander Trauner is nominated for Best Art Direction for The Apartment | ||
| 1961 | Werner Richard Heymann dies at age 75 | ||
| December 19 | 1961 | Stanley Kramer’s Judgment at Nuremberg premieres (Ernest Gold, composer) | |
| 1961 | Franz Planer nominated for Best Cinematography for The Children’s Hour; Eugen Schuftan nominated for Best Cinematography for The Hustler; Dmitri Tiomkin nominated for Best Music and for Best Song for El Cid; Dmitri Tiomkin nominated for Best Music and for Best Song for The Guns of Navarone | ||
| 1962 | Bronislau Kaper nominated for Best Music for Mutiny on the Bounty; Franz Waxman nominated for Best Music for Taras Bulba | ||
| 1963 | Ernest Gold is nominated for Best Music and for Best Song for It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World; Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music and for Best Song for 55 Days at Peking | ||
| 1964 | Peter Lorre dies at age 60 | ||
| 1964 | Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music for The Fall of the Roman Empire | ||
| 1966 | Fred Zinnemann receives Best Director Academy Award for A Man for All Seasons; A Man for All Seasons receives Best Picture Academy Award | ||
| 1966 | Erich Pommer dies at age 77 | ||
| 1967 | Franz Waxman dies at age 61 | ||
| 1969 | Ernest Gold is nominated for Best Music for The Secret of Santa Vittoria | ||
| 1969 | Karl Freund dies at age 79 | ||
| 1970 | Dmitri Tiomkin is nominated for Best Music, for Best Song and for Best Scoring for Tchaikovsky | ||
| 1970 | Frederick Hollander dies at age 70 | ||
| 1972 | Peter Zinner nominated as Best Editor for The Godfather | ||
| 1973 | Robert Siodmak dies at age 73 | ||
| 1975 | Alexander Trauner nominated for Best Art Direction for The Man Who Would Be King | ||
| 1976 | Fritz Lang dies at age 76 | ||
| 1977 | Fred Zinneman nominated as Best Director for Julia; Julia nominated for Best Picture | ||
| 1978 | Peter Zinner nominated as Best Editor for The Deer Hunter | ||
| 1983 | Peter Zinner nominated as Best Editor for An Officer and A Gentleman | ||
| 1985 | Rudi Fehr nominated as Best Editor for Prizzi’s Honor | ||
| 1987 | Billy Wilder receives the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award from the Academy | ||
| 1988 | Paul Kohner dies at age 88 | ||
| 1988 | Henry Koster dies at age 83 | ||
| 1992 | Marlene Dietrich dies at age 91 | ||
| 1992 | Paul Henreid dies at age 87 | ||
| 1994 | Hans J. Salter dies at age 98 | ||
| 1995 | Miklos Rozsa dies at age 88 | ||
| 1997 | Fred Zinnemann dies at age 89 | ||
| 1999 | Rudi Fehr dies at age 88 | ||
| 2000 | Curt Siodmak dies at age 98 | ||
| 2002 | Billy Wilder dies at age 96 |
SOURCES:
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
Museum of Film and Television, Berlin
National Archives
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Stephen Bach
Otto Friedrich (Before The Deluge: A Portrait of Berlin in the 1920s, City of Nets: A Portrait of Hollywood in the 1940s)
Aljean Harmetz, The Making of Casablanca
Elisabeth Heymann
Henry Koster Archive
Klaus Kreimeier, The Ufa Story
Al Lareau
Christof Mauch
Maria Riva
Ed Sikov, On Sunset Boulevard: The Life and Times of Billy Wilder
Ina Sonenberg
John Waxman
Fred Zinneman, A Life in the Movies
www.historyplace.com
www.imdb.com
www.moderntimes.com
www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk
