Peter van Eyck

Peter van Eyck (born Götz von Eick; 16 July 191115 July 1969) was a German-American film and television actor. Born in Prussian Pomerania, he moved to the United States in the 1930’s and established a career as a character actor. After World War II, he returned to his native country and became a star of West German cinema. Internationally, his best known roles included The Wages of Fear (1953), Mr. Arkadin (1955), The Longest Day (1962), The Spy Who Came In from the Cold (1965), and the 1960s Dr. Mabuse films. He was twice nominated for the German Film Award for Best Actor, for Blind Justice (1961) and for The River Line (1964). Biography Van Eyck was born into an aristocratic German family from Pomerania (since 1945 part of Poland). After graduating from high school he studied music in Berlin. While studying music in Berlin, Van Eyck purportedly had a brief liaison with Jean Ross, a cabaret singer who inspired the fictional character of Sally Bowles. Ross became pregnant with Eyck's child and, when Eyck departed Weimar-era Berlin, Ross had an abortion authorized by gay author Christopher Isherwood who falsely claimed to be her impregnator. These factual events served as the genesis for a short story by Isherwood which later became the 1937 novella Sally Bowles and was later adapted into the 1966 Cabaret musical and the 1972 film of the same name.