German postcard for Das Programma von Heute by Ross Verlag. Photo: Ketttler, Berlin.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 9391/1, 1935-1936. Photo: Alpha-Film. Hermann Speelmans in Verlieb Dich nicht am Bodensee/Don't Fall in Love at Lake Constance (Carl Heinz Wolff, 1935).
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 8429/1, 1933-1934. Photo: Ufa / Frhr. von Gudenberg.
A ‘whole guy’ and a good mate
Hermann Speelmans was born Hermann Maria Louise Speelmans in 1902 in Uerdingen, Krefeld, Germany. (Some sources say in 1906). He studied philosophy, art history and sociology in Cologne, Heidelberg and Berlin. During his doctoral thesis on European nihilism, he first came to the theatre as an extra in Cologne.
After graduating, he began his acting career in 1924 at the Schauspielhaus Köln (Cologne Theatre). In 1925 he played in Hagen and in 1926 at the Deutsches Theater in Berlin. He was thought to have disappeared after a voyage. Heinz Hilpert had him searched for, and when Speelmans reappeared in Marseille, he engaged him at the Renaissance Theatre in 1928. In 1930-1931 he worked at the Tribüne, later also at the Komödie.
He made his film debut in 1929 and played small roles in the comedy Ihr dunkler Punkt/Her Dark Secret (Johannes Guter, 1929) starring Lilian Harvey and Willy Fritsch, Diane - Die Geschichte einer Pariserin/Diane - The Story of a Parisian Woman (Erich Waschneck, 1929) with Olga Tschechowa, and the historical drama Danton (Hans Behrendt, 1931) starring Fritz Kortner.
Speelmans was given his first bigger film role in the comedy Der Mann, der seinen Mörder sucht/The Man Who Wanted His Murderer (Robert Siodmak, 1931) co-written by Billy Wilder and starring the upcoming Heinz Rühmann and Lien Deyers. It was followed by roles in other popular films like the comedy Der Hauptmann von Köpenick/The Captain from Köpenick (Richard Oswald, 1931), the Sci-Fi adventure F.P. 1 antwortet nicht/F.P.1 Doesn't Answer (Karl Hartl, 1932) starring Hans Albers, the comedy Strich durch die Rechnung/Spoiling the Game (Alfred Zeisler, 1932), and the action film Ein gewisser Herr Gran/A Certain Mr Gran (Gerhard Lamprecht, 1933).
During the German Reich from 1933 to 1945, he was frequently used in Ufa productions as a ‘whole guy’ and good mate in such Propaganda films as Hitlerjunge Quex/Our Flag Leads Us Forward (Hans Steinhoff, 1933), Ein Mann will nach Deutschland/A German Wants to Go Home (Paul Wegener, 1934) and Alarm auf Station III/Alarm at Station III (Philipp Lothar Mayring, 1939). Sometimes he played a crook, but often he was a friend of the actual hero. Physically, he was a rather unlikely actor to portray Sherlock Holmes on screen. However, in Sherlock Holmes (Erich Engels, 1937) with Trude Marlen, Speelmans appeared as the famous British sleuth, masquerading as Jimmy Ward, a dapper young socialite, working with the secret police to infiltrate a criminal organisation.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. 7548/1, 1932-1933. Photo: Ufa. Autographed in 1933.
German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, Berlin, no. A 3737/1, 1941-1944. Photo: Baumann / Ufa.
The God-gifted list
Hermann Speelmans continued his career during the Second World War with films like the romantic drama Auf Wiedersehen, Franziska!/Goodbye, Franziska! (Helmut Käutner, 1941) starring Marianne Hoppe, and Meine vier Jungens/My Four Boys (Günther Rittau, 1944) with Käthe Haack. He also appeared as Christian Kuchenreutter in the lavish mega-production Münchhausen/The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (Josef von Báky, 1943) starring Hans Albers. Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels ordered the production of Münchhausen to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Ufa film studio which released it.
Münchhausen represented the pinnacle of the Volksfilm style of propaganda designed to entertain the masses and distract the population from the war, borrowing the Hollywood genre of large-budget productions with extensive colourful visuals. The film provided visual relief from the war and, as one of the few fantastical films produced by the Ministry of Propaganda, represented a rare opportunity for escapism. Both during and after World War II, the film saw massive commercial and critical success.
In 1944, Speelmans was on the 'Gottbegnadeten-Liste' (God-gifted list), a 36-page list of artists considered crucial to National Socialist culture. The list was assembled in September 1944 by Joseph Goebbels, the head of the Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, and Germany's supreme leader Adolf Hitler. The list exempted the designated artists from military mobilisation during the final stages of World War II.
At the end of the war in 1945, Speelmans founded his own travelling theatre company ‘Werkstatt’ and toured the provinces with it for three years. During this time, he appeared in the anthology film In jenen Tagen/In Those Days (Helmut Käutner, 1947). During the 1950s, he appeared in films such as Gift im Zoo/Poison in the Zoo (Hans Müller, Wolfgang Staudte, 1952) starring Irene von Meyendorff, the crime film Banditen der Autobahn/Bandits of the Highway (Géza von Cziffra, 1955) and the drama Hanussen (O.W. Fischer, Georg Marischka, 1955) starring O.W. Fischer as the mind-reader who reportedly taught Hitler his crowd control techniques of using gestures and dramatic pauses.
Speelmans suffered from alcohol problems and his engagements dropped off. His final film was the comedy Liebe, Luft und lauter Lügen/Love, Air and Lies (Peter Beauvais, 1959). Speelmans became the German synchronising voice for Herbert Lom and Akim Tamiroff. In 1960, Speelmans collapsed on a Berlin street from a heart attack and died shortly afterwards. He had just signed a contract with the East German film company Defa. Hermann Speelmans was 57. He was buried in the Waldfriedhof Zehlendorf (Zehlendorf forest cemetery), but his grave has since been closed.
German collector card in the series 'Vom Werden deutscher Filmkunst - Der Tonfilm', album no. 11, picture no. 105. Photo: Ufa / Ross Verlag. Hans Adalbert Schlettow, Cilly Feindt and Hermann Speelmans in Ferien von Ich/Vacation from me (Hans Deppe, 1934).
German collector card in the series 'Vom Werden deutscher Filmkunst - Der Tonfilm', album no. 11, picture no. 107. Photo: Ufa / Ross Verlag. Willi Schur, Karl Ludwig Diehl and Hermann Speelmans in Ein Mann will nach Deutschland/A Man Wants to Get to Germany (Paul Wegener, 1934).
Sources: Thomas Staedeli (Cyranos), Wikipedia (English and German) and IMDb.
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