John Banner, the renowned television actor, was born on Tuesday, January 28th, 1910, in Vienna, which was then the capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
As a Jewish individual, Banner was forced to flee his homeland in 1938 after the Anschluss between Nazi Germany and Austria, while he was on tour in Switzerland with an acting company.
Unable to return to Austria due to Hitler's anti-Semitic policies, Banner emigrated to the United States of America as a political refugee, where he knew nothing of the English language.
John Banner was hired as a Master of Ceremonies to a musical revue soon after reaching the United States and had to learn his lines phonetically. He rapidly picked up English through total immersion and eventually became a skilled actor.
Despite his accent and "Nordic" look, Banner was typecast in several films as Nazis during the 1940s, ironically portraying the same villains who were murdering his family members who had been left behind in Austria.
All of his biological parents and siblings perished in concentration camps, and John Banner survived the war, weighing 180 pounds at the time of his emigration.
He eventually added another 100 pounds and became the chubby character actor America knew and loved, appearing regularly in movies and on TV.
John Banner specialized in foreign-official types and played roles such as the 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),which debuted 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, telling TV Guide, "I see Schultz as the representative of some kind of goodness in every generation."
Banner co-starred with Werner Klemperer (who portrayed the equally comical and bumbling "Colonel Klink") and Bob Crane in The Wicked Dreams of Paula Schultz (1968),a bizarre movie "comedy" about a defecting East German athlete.
The picture bombed, but 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 lifespan consisted of 23,011 total days, equaling 3,287 weeks and 2 days.
