German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. A 2543/1, 1939-1940. Photo: Clausen / Tobis.
German postcard by Ross Verlag, no. A 3360/1, 1941-1944. Photo: Binz / Tobis.
German postcard by F.B.Z. Photo: Camera Film / Kurt Julies (Julius).
Titanic
Hans Albert Nielsen was born in 1911 as the son of a merchant in Hamburg, Germany. After attending secondary school he took an apprenticeship as a merchant. He only completed it for the sake of his parents, because he took acting lessons with Albrecht Schoenhals and Erich Ziegel and also trained in singing. In 1932, Nielsen made his theatre debut at the Hamburger Kammerspiele. Further engagements took him to Augsburg, Kiel and Leipzig in the following months. Many actors and performing artists fled Nazi Germany, but Nielsen remained. In 1938, Nielsen went to Berlin and performed at various theatres.
The talented actor had already attracted the attention of the film industry in the mid-1930s and Nielsen made his screen debut with a small part in the romantic comedy Daphne und der Diplomat/Daphne and the Diplomat (Robert A. Stemmle, 1937) in the same year he appeared as pilot Billy Sefton in the melodrama Tango Notturno (Fritz Kirchhoff, 1937). A year later, he took on the role of Max von Wendlowsky in the Zarah Leander film Heimat (Carl Froelich, 1938), based on the play by Hermann Sudermann.
Productions such as the initially banned historical drama Preußische Liebesgeschichte/A Prussian Love Story (Paul Martin, 1938), the adventure Aufruhr in Damaskus/Uproar in Damascus (Gustacv Ucicky, 1939), and the crime thriller Alarm auf Station III/Alarm at Station III (Philipp Lothar Mayring, 1939) followed until the end of the 1930s. In the 1940s, Nielsen appeared in the euthanasia drama Ich klage an/I Accuse (Wolfgang Liebeneiner,1941) as Dr Höfer, which is still considered a ”reserved film’ today.
In the drama Titanic (Herbert Selpin, 1943) about the sinking of the luxury liner RMS Titanic in 1912, Nielsen played the German first officer Petersen. Titanic was commissioned by Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels with the intent of showing not only the superiority of German filmmaking but also as a propaganda vehicle which would depict British and American capitalism as being responsible for the disaster. The addition of an entirely fictional heroic German officer, Petersen, to the ship's crew, was intended to demonstrate the superior bravery and selflessness of German men as compared to the British officers. The film's original director, Herbert Selpin, was arrested during production after making disparaging comments about the German army and the war in the East. He was found hanged in prison, and the film was completed by Werner Klingler, who was not credited.
Although the film had a brief theatrical run in parts of German-occupied Europe starting in November 1943, it was not shown within Germany by order of Goebbels, who feared that it would weaken the German citizenry's morale instead of improving it, as heavy Allied bombing raids made a film depicting mass panic and death unappealing. Goebbels later banned the film's playing entirely, and it did not have a second run. Until the end of the war, Nielsen appeared in productions including the drama Der große König/The Great King (Veit Harlan, 1942) starring Otto Gebühr. The comedy Dr. Phil. Döderlein (1945) remained unfinished.
Big German card by Ross Verlag. Photo: Froelich-Film / Ufa. Ruth Hellberg and Hans Nielsen in Heimat (Carl Froelich, 1938).
Latvian postcard by E&B, Riga, no. 2570. Photo: A.S. "Ars". Sent by mail in 1938.
Different from you and me
After the end of the Second World War, Hans Nielsen was able to continue his earlier successes on the big screen with mostly high-profile supporting roles, but also leading roles. He appeared, for example, as King Peter Petroni in the comedy of mistaken identity Herzkönig/King of Hearts (Helmut Weiss, 1947) and as Wolfgang Grunelius in the episodic film In jenen Tagen/In Those Days (1947) directed by Helmuth Käutner. It was one of the cycle of Rubble films made in the wake of Germany's defeat during World War II.
In 1949, he shone alongside Luise Ullrich and Dieter Borsche in the drama Nachtwache/Keepers of the Night (Harald Braun, 1949). He impressively portrayed the pastor Johannes Heger, who finds himself in a conflict of conscience. In 1950, he was seen in the role of chief inspector Thomsen in Kurt Hoffmann's crime thriller Fünf unter Verdacht/Five Suspects (1950), based on the novel ‘Thomas verhört die Prima’ by Herbert Moll and Rudolf Becker.
He often played good-natured, likeable and elegant roles, like the presiding judge in the satire Hokuspokus/Hocuspocus (Kurt Hoffmann, 1953). He usually appeared older in his roles than he was, often playing the benevolent head of the family. However, many of the productions in which Nielsen appeared were successful not least because of him.
In the criminal melodrama Teufel in Seide/Devil in Silk (Rolf Hansen, 1955) with Lilli Palmer and Curd Jürgens, he was the committed defence lawyer, as well as in the legal drama Gestehen Sie, Dr. Corda!/Confess, Doctor Corda! (Josef von Báky, 1958) with Hardy Krüger and Kriegsgericht/Court Martial (Kurt Meisel, 1959), based on the story ‘Kreuzer Pommern’ by Willi Berthold with Karlheinz Böhm, Christian Wolff and Klaus Kammer as three shipwrecked German marines. In Wolfgang Liebeneiner's romanticised historical film Königin Luise/Queen Luise (1957), he lent character to Minister Karl August von Hardenberg alongside Ruth Leuwerik as Queen Luise.
His role as Max Mertens in Anders als du und ich/Different from You and Me (Veit Harlan, 1957) is rather negligible. As Filmdienst.de notes: ‘The film by no means sees homosexuality as a positive alternative to life, and also defames abstract painting and atonal music, which it portrays as the expression of such an ‘attitude to life’.
German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3601/1. Photo: Tobis / Binz.
German postcard by Film-Foto-Verlag, no. A 3750/1, 1941-1944. Photo: Tobis / Binz.
German postcard by Netter's Starverlag, Berlin, no. F-353. Lisa Lesco and Hans Nielsen in Herzkönig/King of Hearts (Helmut Weiss, 1947).
Scotland Yard vs. Dr Mabuse
Hans Nielsen did not become a real screen star in German post-war films, probably because he was confined to the type of dignified grand seigneur, the ‘actor of sober businessmen and grumpy but spirited clergymen’, as one critic once described him. He founded a cabaret group, ‘Die Außenseiter’ (The Outsider) after the war, and appeared in revues by Günter Neumann.
Engagements took him to the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus, the Renaissance-Theater and the Theater am Kurfürstendamm in Berlin, among others. One of his most important theatre roles was that of the Cardinal in the 1963 premiere of Rolf Hochhuth's play ‘Der Stellvertreter’, directed by Erwin Piscator at Berlin's Theater am Kurfürstendamm, with Dieter Borsche as Pope Pius XII.
During the 1960s, he also appeared in films like Sherlock Holmes und das Halsband des Todes/Sherlock Holmes and the Deadly Necklace (Terence Fisher, 1963) with Christopher Lee, Scotland Yard jagt Dr. Mabuse/Scotland Yard Hunts Dr. Mabuse or Scotland Yard vs. Dr Mabuse (Paul May, 1963) starring Peter van Eyck, and Das indische Touch/The Indian Scarf (Alfred Vohrer, 1963). His only Hollywood film was Town Without Pity (Gottfried Reinhardt, 1961) with Kirk Douglas.
In addition to his extensive acting work for theatre and film, Hans Nielsen was also a sought-after dubbing actor. He was the German voice of Errol Flynn, Tyrone Power, Trevor Howard, James Stewart, Fred Astaire and Spencer Tracy. His final film was the Western Die Hölle von Manitoba/The Hell of Manitoba (Sheldon Reynolds, 1965) starring Lex Barker and Pierre Brice.
Hans Nielsen died in 1965 in West Berlin at the age of just 53. He had previously been admitted to hospital with back problems and was diagnosed with leukaemia on examination. The popular actor was laid to rest in the Heerstraße Cemetery in the Berlin district of Westend. The actor had been married to Anna Katharina Elisabeth Novian since 1937. Despite having a daughter together, the marriage failed. After the divorce, Nielsen married his second wife Annemarie Giersch, who brought a son into the marriage. Wife number 3 was Jutta Jusseit. The couple married a few months before his death in 1965. In 2023, film historian Thomas Barthol published a biography of the artist entitled ‘Hans Nielsen: Der charmante Kavalier’. Nielsen never played in the top league of film stars, but ‘knew how to convince with his acting and vocal skills’.
German postcard by Starfoto Hasemann, no. 456. Photo: Herzog.
German postcard by Photo-Kitt, München, no. 503. Photo: Camera Film / Kurt Julies / Herzog.
West German card. Photo: Komet / Panorama / Ewald. Hans Nielsen in Die blaue Stunde/The Blue Hour (Veit Harlan, 1953).
Sources: Stephanie D’heil (Steffi-Line - German), Wikipedia, and IMDb.
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