John Brahm

Hailed by some as a unique stylist and by others as a rank imitator of better directors, John Brahm was the son of German actor Ludwig Brahm and the nephew of European theatrical impresario Otto Brahm. Shuttling between Vienna, Berlin and Paris after World War I, the Hamburg-born Brahm was resident director for such acting troupes as Deutsches Kunstler Theatre and the Lessing Theatre; along the way, he married prominent Teutonic stage and film actress Dolly Haas. The emergence of Hitler compelled Brahm to emigrate to England, where, after working as a movie production supervisor, he was given his first chance to direct a film, the 1936 remake of the old D.W. Griffith chestnut Broken Blossoms, which starred his wife. He came to America in 1937 with a fat contract from Columbia Pictures in his hand, helming many of that studio's "A"-minus and "B" pictures before moving to 20th Century-Fox in the early 1940s. Amidst many pedestrian efforts, Brahm directed the atmospheric, shadow-drenched terror pieces The Undying Monster (1942), The Lodger (1944) and Hangover Square (1945). His career flagging in the 1950s, Brahm switched his attentions to television, where he helmed some of the best-ever episodes of such series as "Alfred Hitchcock Presents," "The Twilight Zone," "Thriller" and "The Outer Limits." John Brahm's last theatrical feature was the 1967 potboiler Hot Rods to Hell, which was originally intended to be a made-for-TV movie.