William Dieterle - Hollywood Career: 1930s

Hollywood Career: 1930s

In 1930, the political and economic situations in Germany worsened and, like many from the German film industry, Dieterle emigrated to the United States. Dieterle had said "It was a running joke in Berlin...if the phone rang at a restaurant they said it must be Hollywood. Well one night my wife and I were dining out and it really happened." Dieterle was offered a job at First National to make synchronized versions of Hollywood films in German, as the studios were afraid of losing foreign business with the advent of sound films. Instead, when Dieterle, his wife and a group of actors arrived they found that the films had already been synchronized and they were able to completely remake German versions of four Hollywood films, including Lloyd Bacon's Moby Dick (in which Dieterle played Ahab). After the four films were completed, Warner Brothers' Vice President of Production Hal B. Wallis was so impressed that he invited Dieterle stay stay in Hollywood. He became a US citizen in 1937.

He adapted quickly to Hollywood filmmaking with his first film, The Last Flight (1931). The film depicts four American fighter pilots who roam around Paris after World War I trying to put their lives back together. It starred Richard Barthelmess and Helen Chandler and was compared to the writings of F. Scott Fitzgerald. Although not a success on its first run, it was hailed as a forgotten masterpiece at a 1970 revival screening. His initial Hollywood career was neither successful nor notable, and included such film as the W. C. Fields musical Her Majesty, Love, Jewel Robbery, Adorable and Fog Over Frisco with Bette Davis.

In 1934, Max Reinhardt was staging a version of A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles. Dieterle convinced Warner Brothers to finance a big budget version of the film with an all-star cast. The resulting film, A Midsummer Night's Dream, revitalized Dieterle's career as a major Hollywood director. Starring James Cagney, Olivia de Havilland, Joe E. Brown and an 11-year-old Mickey Rooney, the film had very mixed reviews for its "Americanization" of Shakespeare, but was a success on release and considered a classic today. During production, Reinhardt would rehearse the actors and then let Dieterle direct the film.

Dieterle then directed the first of his famous and hugely successful "biography films" with actor Paul Muni, beginning with The Story of Louis Pasteur in 1935. The film starred Paul Muni as the famous scientist who discovered the principles of vaccination and struggled against a skeptical medical community. The film was a success both critically and financially and earned Muni the Oscar for Best Actor. It also help to establish Warner Brothers as a producer of "prestige pictures" after almost a decade of being known primarily for crime dramas. Unfortunately this led to several films which Dieterle did not like because "at Warners the moment you had a success they gave you something terrible to keep you from getting a swelled head." These films included the second version of Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon, Satan Met a Lady with Bette Davis, The Prince and the Pauper and another bio-pic about Florence Nightingale, The White Angel.

Dieterle was then allowed to make another bio-pic with Paul Muni, The Life of Emile Zola. Based on the life of the French philosopher and novelist Émile Zola, the film mostly depicts Zola's commitment to the infamous Dreyfus affair of a Jewish French officer falsely accused of treason by his superiors and sent to prison. The film was an enormous success and writer Frank S. Nugent called it "the finest historical film ever made and the greatest screen biography." It was nominated for 10 Academy Awards and won for Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor for Joseph Schildkraut (as Dreyfus) and Best Screenplay. Dieterle lost the award for Best Director to Leo McCarey. It was his only nomination.

Dieterle's next film is perhaps his most infamous, as it would come back to haunt both him and screenwriter John Howard Lawson later in life. Blockade stars Henry Fonda as a dedicated Loyalist fighter and Madeline Carroll as the reluctant Franco spy who falls in love with him during the Spanish Civil War. The film was openly anti-fascist and critical of nations that stood by and let fascist dictators commit atrocities. It was mildly controversial upon release, but would become one of the major films cited by Congressional Committees during the Hollywood Witch Hunt of the 1940s and 1950s. Its 1938 premiere at Grauman's Chinese Theater was abruptly and inexplicably cancelled.

Juarez was the third biographical picture that Dieterle made with Paul Muni, depicting the life of Mexican politician Benito Juárez and his conflict with Emperor Maximilian I. Upon its release, Dieterle was called "the quintessential liberal director of the 30s" and when interviewed in the 1970s Dieterle said "it should be the biggest kind of picture right now- a big modern army worn down by guerrilla fighters. The parallel with Vietnam is so obvious."

Dieterle again found both financial and critical success with The Hunchback of Notre Dame in 1939. The film starred Charles Laughton as Quasimodo and a 19-year-old Maureen O'Hara as Esmeralda. Dieterle then made two more bio-pics, this time both starring Edward G. Robinson instead of Paul Muni. Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet is about Paul Ehrlich's discovery of Salvarsan, which made syphilis curable; and A Dispatch From Reuter's, about the man who established the first news agency. These were his last films for Warner brothers.