Dolly Haas

Dolly Haas
Haas in 1955
Born	(1910-04-29)April 29, 1910 Hamburg, Germany
Died	New York, N.Y.
Cause of death	Cancer
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1930–81
Spouse(s)	John Brahm (date ?) Al Hirschfeld (1943-1994; her death)

Dorothy Clara Louise "Dolly" Haas (29 April 1910 – 16 September 1994) was an actress and singer who played in German and American films, and often appeared in Broadway plays. Her husband was caricaturist Al Hirschfeld.

Life and work

Haas was born in Hamburg, Germany, to Charles Oswald Haas, a bookseller of British origin, and Margarete Maria (née Hansen). Haas was an accomplished actress in German cinema before moving to the United States.

Her first marriage was to German-born film director John Brahm, who at one point was resident director for acting troupes such as Deutsches Theater and the Lessing Theater, both in Berlin. Haas, a naturalized U.S. citizen, married her second husband, famed Jewish New York Times portraitist Al Hirschfeld in Baltimore, Maryland in 1943. They had a daughter, Nina, born in 1945. Haas died 16 September 1994 from ovarian cancer in New York, aged 84.

Although Haas did not appear in many English language films, she did have an important role in Alfred Hitchcock's 1953 film, I Confess. Haas was a personal friend of Hitchcock's, and Hitchcock cast her as Alma Keller, the wife of the murderer—janitor Otto Keller. This high-profile film also starred Montgomery Clift, Anne Baxter, Karl Malden and Brian Aherne.

Dolly Haas enjoyed a brief but successful stage career in the United States as well, appearing alongside such luminaries as John Gielgud and Lillian Gish in the 1947 revival of Crime and Punishment. She replaced Mary Martin in the lead role in Lute Song in 1946 for the touring production. Her co-star, Yul Brynner, said that Haas' casting substantially improved the show, stating that, "Dolly Haas understood the part. She had an affinity for it, and the play immediately improved. It wasn't at all that Dolly was a better actress. She was just better casting for the part than Mary." Mary Martin agreed with Brynner's assessment, and she helped Haas to prepare for the role in a very short span of time allotted for rehearsal.

Filmography

• Eine Stunde Glück (1930)
• Dolly macht Karriere (1930)
• Der Ball (1931)
• The Virtuous Sinner (1931)
• Liebeskommando (1931)
• A Tremendously Rich Man (1932)
• Es wird schon wieder besser (1932)
• Scampolo (1932)
• You Don't Forget Such a Girl (1932)
• Großstadtnacht (1932)
• Die kleine Schwindlerin (1933)
• Das häßliche Mädchen (1933)
• Kleines Mädel - großes Glück (1933)
• The Page from the Dalmasse Hotel (1933)
• Ein Mädel mit Tempo (1934)
• Girls Will Be Boys (1935)
• Warum lügt Fräulein Käthe? (1935)
• Broken Blossoms (1936)
• Spy of Napoleon (1936)
• Riviera (1949)
• I Confess (1953)
• The Fugitive (1954, from the Armstrong Circle Theatre TV series)
• Regarding File Number 4356 (1956, from the Studio One TV series )

External links

• Dolly Haas at the Internet Movie Database
• Dolly Haas at IBDb.com
• Dolly Haas Family Collection, AR 25447 Archival Collection at the Leo Baeck Institute, New York

• Photographs and literature