Wera Engels
Wera Engels was a daughter of a German Admiral and Governor of the then German colony Tsing-tau-China. After successful leading roles in productions of the well-established German UFA-studios in Babelsberg as well as in France, Engels was invited to Hollywood. Producers saw her as a cheap alternative to Greta Garbo and Marlene Dietrich. She was contracted with RKO. Engels was given roles under Walter Futter and M.H. Hoffman. She and the silent movie super star Mary Pickford became best friends. By 1935 she returned to Germany, but left soon thereafter, because of the decline of the German movie industry caused by the Nazi propaganda machine. Back in Hollywood, she dated Gary Cooper for a while but married the Lithuanian-born actor/writer Ivan Lebedeff. After Lebedeff's death in 1953 of Angina pectoris, she moved back to Europe, where she stayed with several friends in London and Stockholm before she went back to Germany. She lived the rest of her life with Erna Hoffmann (widow of Heinrich Hoffmann, Hitler's friend and personal photographer) in the Munich area. She died on November 16, 1988 (age 79) in Munich, Germany.
Known For
Credits
- 1937 · Talking About Jacqueline as Jacqueline Topelius
- 1936 · Stjenka Rasin as Prinzessin Dolgoruki
- 1935 · Hong Kong Nights as Trina Vidor
- 1935 · The Great Impersonation as Princess Stephanie Elderstrom
- 1935 · Together We Live as Sonia
- 1935 · Sweepstake Annie as Baroness Yvonne Baritska
- 1934 · Fugitive Road as Sonya Valinoff
- 1933 · The Great Jasper as Norma McGowd
- 1931 · Lucky children as
- 1931 · Scent of the Woman in Black as Edith Rance
- 1931 · English as it is spoken as
- 1930 · The Gripper as Mabel
- 1928 · Befehl zur Ehe as
- 1928 · The Girl from Spree Woods as
- 1927 · Hast Du geliebt am schönen Rhein? as Ellen Shiffer
- 1927 · Lützow's Wild Hunt as
- 1927 · Mädchenhandel - Eine internationale Gefahr as Irene Wendtland
- 1927 · Fighting the White Slave Traffic as Irene Wendtland