Frederick Hollander

The son of German conductor/composer Victor Hollander, Frederick Hollander prepared for his own career at the Academy of Music in Berlin. Hollander went on to compose incidental themes for several Max Reinhardt productions, and to write and stage... more

The son of German conductor/composer Victor Hollander, Frederick Hollander prepared for his own career at the Academy of Music in Berlin. Hollander went on to compose incidental themes for several Max Reinhardt productions, and to write and stage revues ( including the popular Tingel, Tangel) for his own Berlin theatre. Entering films in 1929, Hollander was instrumental in promoting Marlene Dietrich to stardom via his composition "Falling in Love Again" in The Blue Angel. In 1933, he directed and scored the German feature film Ich und die Kaiserin (U.S. title: The Only Girl) then relocated to Hollywood. In 1939, he again made a major contribution to the Marlene Dietrich mystique, collaborating with Frank Loesser on the lively ditty "See What the Boys in the Back Room Will Have" for the Dietrich-Jimmy Stewart western spoof Destry Rides Again. During his 23 years in the Hollywood studio system, he earned four Academy Award nominations, for Artists and Models (1937), Talk of the Town (1942) That Lady in Ermine (1947) and The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T (1953). He returned to Germany in 1956, where he wrote the music for one more film, Das Spukschloss im Spessart (1959). In 1961, director Billy Wilder, whose 1948 feature Berlin Affair had been scored by Frederick Hollander, nostalgically cast Hollander in One Two Three (1961) as the singer/bandleader of an East Berlin nitery. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide less