Friedrich Hollaender

From Wikipedia the free encyclopedia Friedrich Hollaender in exile also Frederick Hollander 18 October 1896 18 January 1976 was a German film composer and author He was born in London where his father operetta composer Victor Hollaender worked as a musical director at the Barnum Bailey Circus Young Hollaender had a solid music and theatre family background his uncle Gustav was director of the Stern Conservatory in Berlin his uncle Felix Hollaender was a wellknown novelist and drama critic who later worked with Max Reinhardt at the Deutsches Theater In 1899 Hollaenders family returned to Berlin his father began teaching at the Stern Conservatory where his son became a student in Engelbert Humperdincks master class In the evening he played the piano at silent film performances in local cinemas developing the art of musical improvisation By the age of 18 he was employed as a répétiteur at the New German Theatre in Prague and also was put in charge of troop entertainment at the Western Front of World War I Having finished his studies he composed music for productions by Max Reinhardt and became involved in Berlins Kabarett scene Together with Kurt Tucholsky Klabund Walter Mehring Mischa Spoliansky and Joachim Ringelnatz he worked in venues like Reinhardts Schall und Rauch ensemble at the Großes Schauspielhaus or the Wilde Bühne led by Trude Hesterberg at the Theater des Westens in Charlottenburg where he established the TingelTangelTheater cabaret in 1931 In 1919 he married the actress Blandine Ebinger the couple divorced in 1926 Their daughter Philine later became the wife of the cabarettist Georg Kreisler Hollaender had his final breakthrough when he wrote the film score for The Blue Angel 1930 including the most popular song Falling in Love Again Cant Help It performed by Marlene Dietrich He had to leave Nazi Germany in 1933 because of his Jewish descent1 and first moved to Paris He emigrated to the United States the next year where he wrote the music for over a hundred films including Destry Rides Again 1939 A Foreign Affair 1948 The 5000 Fingers of Dr T 1953 Academy Award nomination and Sabrina 1954 Many of his songs were again made famous by Marlene Dietrich He can be seen as the piano accompanist in A Foreign Affair on the songs Black Market Illusions and Ruins of Berlin He received four Academy Award nominations for composition As Frederick Hollander he also wrote the semiautobiographical novel Those Torn From Earth released in 1941 which details the flight from Germany that many Jewish members of the film industry embarked on after the Nazis came to power and instituted the Nuremberg Laws In 1956 he returned to Germany and again worked for several years as a revue composer at the Theater Die Kleine Freiheit in Munich He made a cameo appearance in Billy Wilders film comedy One Two Three 1960 as a Kapellmeister Hollaender died 1976 in Munich and is buried in the Obergiesing Ostfriedhof