Gert Fröbe

Karl Gerhart Fröbe, better known as Gert Fröbe (February 25, 1913 — September 5, 1988), was a German actor who starred in many films, including the James Bond film Goldfinger as Auric Goldfinger and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang as Baron Bomburst.

Fröbe made several appearances in big all-star casts in the 1960s, including the films The Longest Day, Is Paris Burning?, and Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines. Due to his thick German accent, Fröbe was dubbed in some of his classic roles, including by British actor Michael Collins in Goldfinger.

Fröbe gained early fame in one of the first films made after WWII, called Berliner Ballade (The Ballad of Berlin, 1948), as a very thin man. That changed rapidly in later films. In 1958 Fröbe was cast as the villain in the Swiss film Es geschah am hellichten Tag (It Happened in Broad Daylight), which was novelised by Swiss author Friedrich Dürrenmatt. His role as an insane murderer of children drew the attention of the producers of Goldfinger and he was finally to play one of the most remarkable and remembered villains of the series, gold tycoon Auric Goldfinger.

While Fröbe was a member of the Nazi Party before and during World War II, he aided German Jews by hiding them from the Gestapo before 1945. Owing to his connection to the Nazi Party, the film Goldfinger was banned in Israel until he was publicly thanked by a Jewish family.