John Banner

John Banner, who achieved television immortality for his portrayal of the Luftwaffe POW camp guard Sergeant Schultz in the TV series Hogan's Heroes (1965), was born on Tuesday, January 28th, 1910 in Vienna., which in 1938 was then the capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

The 28-year-old Banner, who was Jewish, was forced to flee from his homeland to avoid being captured after the Anschluss (union) between Nazi Germany and Austria. This occurred while he was engaged in a tour of Switzerland with an acting company. Unable to return to Austria due to Hitler's anti-Semitic policies of persecution, Banner emigrated to the United States of America as a political refugee.

Soon after reaching the United States, John Banner, who knew nothing of the English language, was hired to be a Master of Ceremonies to a musical revue. He had to learn his lines phonetically. The total immersion paid off in that he rapidly picked up English. His accent and "Nordic" look ironically meant that Banner was typecast in several films as Nazis during the 1940s. He survived the war portraying the same villains who were murdering every member of his family, who had been left behind in Austria. All of them perished in concentration camps; his biological parents and all of his siblings perished.

At the time of his emigration to the US, John Banner weighed a trim 180 pounds. He eventually added another 100 pounds to become the chubby character actor America would come to know and love in regular appearances in movies and on TV. He specialized in foreign-official types, such the his role as Soviet Ambassador in Fred MacMurray's comedy movie, Kisses for My President (1964).

In 1965, Bing Crosby Productions cast Banner as "Sergeant Schultz", in the wartime comedy television sitcom, Hogan's Heroes (1965). The show debuted on Friday evening, September 17th, 1965, on CBS channels. The series was a take-off on Billy Wilder's Stalag 17 (1953), although with much more humor and less drama. The bumbling Dutch uncle who Banner portrayed was a continent apart from the wickedly evil Nazis he had portrayed during World War II. Spectacularly inept as a guard of Allied prisoners of war, Sergeant Schultz was prone to ignoring the irregularities that transpired in the fictional Stalag 13, bellowing firmly, "I know nothing! I see nothing! Nothing!!!"

John Banner enjoyed the role but demurred when accused of portraying a "cuddly" Nazi. He told TV Guide, "I see Schultz as the representative of some kind of goodness in every generation."

Banner and Werner Klemperer (who portrayed the equally comical and bumbling "Colonel Klink", and who, like Banner, was a Jewish refugee who had escaped Hitler's reach), co-starred with the series' leading actor, Bob Crane, in The Wicked Dreams of Paula Schultz (1968), a bizarre movie "comedy" about a defecting East German athlete. The picture bombed and the trio went back to turning out the highly popular series without losing too much pride or momentum.

After the cancellation of Hogan's Heroes (1965) in 1971, Banner was signed for another TV show set in the past. The Chicago Teddy Bears (1971), which was set during the Prohibition era. Banner's "Uncle Latzi" was a close cousin of Schultz, but lightning did not strike twice and the series was canceled after only 13 episodes in a three month season.

John Banner died on his 63rd birthday, Sunday, January 28th, 1973, in his hometown and country of Vienna, Austria. His 63 year (including 16 Leap Days) lifespan consisted of 23,011 total days, equaling 3,287 weeks and 2 days.