ACTOR
Fritz Lang
30 archived facts 5 topics 1 source Last reviewed Oct 2026
All facts (30)
- #001
Fritz Lang's films, especially his early work, were highly influential and were said to have influenced the work of directors such as Alfred Hitchcock, Luis Buñuel and Orson Welles.
- #002
Lang's first wife, Lisa Rosenthal, committed suicide by shooting herself in the chest. It was said she did so after finding her husband in a compromising situation with Thea von Harbou.
- #003
Lang had Peter Lorre whistle in M (1931). He felt the off-key whistle was right for the character.
- #004
During World War I, Lang served as a soldier in the Austro-Hungarian army — he was Austrian, not German as is generally believed — and fought in Russia and Romania, where he was wounded three times. He also fought in Italy, where he was wounded, and was commissioned as a lieutenant (he had enlisted as a private).
- #005
Lang was one of the most personally disliked directors in both Germany and the United States, and this upset him in Hollywood, where at times some actresses refused to work with him.
- #006
As an adult, Lang learned to speak French and English in addition to his native German.
- #007
After a trip to America, Lang returned to Germany to make Metropolis (1927), probably his most famous work. It was on this film that Lang earned his reputation as a "tyrant" on set (even in the 1940s, long after he had settled in the US, many actors and actresses in Hollywood refused to work with him because of his bad behavior on set).
- #008
When Lang decided to leave Germany in 1933, his wife Thea von Harbou divorced him. She stayed in Germany and made propaganda films for the Nazi regime.
- #009
Unlike most silent-era directors, Lang welcomed the arrival of sound, though he did not rush into it — while the sound era is generally considered to have begun in 1927, he did not make a sound film until 1931, but it was one of his best films: M (1931). Telling the dark story of a child molester who abuses and kills a young girl, the film was a major international hit and made its lead, Peter Lorre, a star. The film was especially meaningful for German audiences because of two cases of serial-killer child molesters, Peter Kurten and Fritz Haarman.
- #010
Lang was named the 30th greatest director of all time by Entertainment Weekly.
- #011
In his later years, Lang said that, having left his native Austria and lived in various countries, he regarded himself as a "cosmopolitan," but that the only place where he truly felt at home was the lobby of the French Cinémathèque in Paris.
- #012
Lang was interviewed in Peter Bogdanovich's book "Who the Devil Made It: Conversations with Robert Aldrich, George Cukor, Allan Dwan, Howard Hawks, Alfred Hitchcock, Chuck Jones, Fritz Lang, Joseph H. Lewis, Sidney Lumet, Leo McCarey, Otto Preminger, Don Siegel, Josef von Sternberg, Frank Tashlin, Edgar G. Ulmer, Raoul Walsh." NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1997.
- #013
Producer Erich Pommer offered Lang The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), but the director thought the film's expressionist style would not be understood by audiences. Instead he made The Spiders - Episode 2: The Diamond Ship (1920), the final part of "The Spiders."
- #014
In 1964, Lang was president of the "Official Competition" jury at the 17th Cannes International Film Festival.
- #015
After leaving Germany, Lang spent some time in France, then went to England and finally to the United States. There he helped found the Anti-Nazi League.
- #016
In 1918 in Berlin, Lang met producer Erich Pommer, who hired him as an actor and screenwriter.
- #017
Before his death in 1976, Lang planned to make a film about hippie culture.
- #018
In 1915, during World War I, Lang was drafted into the Austro-Hungarian Imperial Army. While a lieutenant in Italy, he was wounded in the shoulder and was decorated for it.
- #019
Compared with other German directors, Lang made only a few films in the 1920s, but the relatively small number he did make are regarded as classics of cinema history.
- #020
Fritz Lang collected primitive art.
- #021
Fritz Lang was buried at Forest Lawn in the Hollywood Hills, Los Angeles, California, USA, in the Enduring Faith section, immediately to the right of plot number 3818, two rows in from the walkway.
- #022
After the outbreak of World War I, Fritz Lang volunteered for the Austro-Hungarian army and was sent to the Russian, Romanian and Italian fronts, where he was wounded several times. He was awarded numerous medals for bravery. He wrote his first screenplays during his stay in a military hospital, and one of them was most likely realized for director Joe May's Stuart-Webbs series. After 1917, May adapted several of Lang's screenplays for Das rollende Hotel (1918), a sequel to the successful "Joe Deebs" series Sein schwierigster Fall (1915).
- #023
At the time of his death, Fritz Lang was nearly blind.
- #024
Fritz Lang was the second son of architect Anton Lang and Pauline Schlesinger.
- #025
In 1933, Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels invited Fritz Lang to his office for a meeting. Goebbels offered him the leadership of the German film industry. Lang told him he needed to think it over, and upon leaving the meeting he went straight to the train station and boarded a train to Paris, France.
- #026
Biography: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume One, 1890-1945." Pages 609-624. New York: H. W. Wilson Company, 1987.
- #027
Fritz Lang was known as a very private man who refused to discuss anything about himself during interviews.
- #028
In 1967, Fritz Lang was interviewed by his fellow director Peter Bogdanovich.
- #029
Peter Lorre never forgave Fritz Lang for his treatment on the film set, especially for making him throw M down some steps 12 times before Lang was satisfied with the shot.
- #030
Peter Lorre never forgave Fritz Lang for his treatment on the set of M, especially for making him go down some steps 12 times before he was satisfied with the shot.
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