Details

Release year: 1951

Storyline

Concentration camp survivor Victoria Kowelska finds herself involved in mystery, greed, and murder after she assumes the identity of a dead friend in order to gain passage to America.

Top credits

Directors

Robert Wise

Writers

Cast

Richard Basehart — Alan Spender
Valentina Cortese — Victoria Kowelska
William Lundigan — Major Marc Bennett
Fay Baker — Margaret

See all 40 credits →

Awards

0 wins & 1 nomination

See all awards →

Did you know

• Recently-widowed Richard Basehart and Valentina Cortese fell in love while making The House on Telegraph Hill (1951) and were married within a year. He moved to Italy to live with her, pretty much giving up his Hollywood career in the process. While he did make a few American movies in the 1950s, he made more European films including Federico Fellini's La Strada (1954). When he and Cortesa divorced in 1960, he returned to the States, remarried, and resumed acting in American movies and television. Cortesa pursued her career in Italy very successfully on stage and screen, and died in Milan, Italy in 2019 at age 96 of an undisclosed cause.

• Julius Castle, a restaurant with a castle-like exterior located on San Francisco's Telegraph Hill, was used as the exterior of the house in the film. The filmmakers built a mansion-like exterior around parts of the restaurant to hide certain elements (such as the "Julius Castle" sign on the outside wall). Built in 1922, Julius Castle served as a high-class restaurant until it closed in 2008. (It is currently for sale.)

• The role of the real Karin Dernakova in the concentration camp was played by Natasha Lytess. Just a few years later, she was employed by Marilyn Monroe as her first on- and off-set drama coach. Eventually she was replaced by Actors Studio guru Lee Strasberg and his wife Paula Strasberg, who served as on-set coaches during Monroe's last six films.