AllMovie

Had he lived, callous-looking German-born actor Ullrich Haupt may have inherited the mantle of the "Man You Love to Hate" from Erich Von Stroheim. Haupt played a Stroheim-like role in The Tempest (1929), a late silent set during the Russian Revolution, in which he as an aristocratic Russian officer coolly stubs out a cigarette on the neck of poor Louis Wolheim. Although the screenplay for the film was credited to C. Gardner Sullivan, Stroheim had authored an earlier draft, most likely with the intention of playing the role himself. Haupt, meanwhile, survived the changeover to sound in such films as Josef Von Sternberg's Morocco (1930), only to perish in a freak hunting accident in 1931. Confusingly, another Ullrich Haupt began appearing in German television and films in the 1950s. This younger actor/director's exact kinship to the original Ullrich Haupt, if any, is unknown.