Stalag 17
Encyclopedia
Stalag 17 is a 1953 war film
War film
War films are a film genre concerned with warfare, usually about naval, air or land battles, sometimes focusing instead on prisoners of war, covert operations, military training or other related subjects. At times war films focus on daily military or civilian life in wartime without depicting battles...

 which tells the story of a group of American airmen
United States Army Air Forces
The United States Army Air Forces was the military aviation arm of the United States of America during and immediately after World War II, and the direct predecessor of the United States Air Force....

 held in a German
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...

 World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 prisoner of war
Prisoner of war
A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...

 camp, who come to suspect that one of their number is a traitor. It was adapted from a Broadway play.

Produced and directed by Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder was an Austro-Hungarian born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist, and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age...

, it starred William Holden
William Holden
William Holden was an American actor. Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1954 and the Emmy Award for Best Actor in 1974...

, Don Taylor
Don Taylor (actor)
Don Taylor was an American movie actor and director best known for his performances in 1950s classics like Stalag 17 and Father of the Bride and the 1948 film noir The Naked City...

, Robert Strauss
Robert Strauss (actor)
Robert Strauss was a gravel-voiced American actor.-Career:Strauss began his career as a classical actor, appearing in The Tempest and Macbeth on Broadway in 1930...

, Neville Brand
Neville Brand
Neville Brand was an American television and movie actor.-Early life:Neville Brand was born in Illinois. He was born to Leo and Helen Brand as one of seven children. Leo, was an electrician and bridge building steel worker in Detroit, where Neville was raised...

, Harvey Lembeck
Harvey Lembeck
Harvey Lembeck was an American comedic actor best remembered for his role as Cpl. Rocco Barbella on The Phil Silvers Show in the late 1950s, and as the stumbling, overconfident outlaw biker Eric Von Zipper in the beach party movie series during the 1960s...

, and Peter Graves
Peter Graves (actor)
Peter Aurness , known professionally as Peter Graves, was an American film and television actor. He was best known for his starring role in the CBS television series Mission: Impossible from 1967 to 1973...

 (Strauss and Lembeck both appeared in the original Broadway production); Wilder also cast Otto Preminger
Otto Preminger
Otto Ludwig Preminger was an Austro–Hungarian-American theatre and film director.After moving from the theatre to Hollywood, he directed over 35 feature films in a five-decade career. He rose to prominence for stylish film noir mysteries such as Laura and Fallen Angel...

 in the role of the camp's Commandant.

The film was adapted by Wilder and Edwin Blum
Edwin Blum
Edwin Harvey Blum was an American screenwriter. He was born in Atlantic City, New Jersey and died in Santa Monica, California. Films screenwritten by Blum include Stalag 17 , and The New Adventures of Tarzan.-External links:...

 from the Broadway play by Donald Bevan
Donald Bevan
Donald Bevan was an American playwright whose works include the Broadway play Stalag 17, co-written with Edmund Trzcinski, and adapted as a movie in 1953. He was also a caricaturist for Sardi's restaurant in New York City.-External links:...

 and Edmund Trzcinski
Edmund Trzcinski
Edmund Trzcinski was an American playwright who was born in The Bronx, New York City, New York and died in Manhattan. An enlisted member of the 8th Air Force his airplane was shot down over Germany and he was sent to Luft Stalag 17B...

 who were both prisoners in Stalag
Stalag
In Germany, stalag was a term used for prisoner-of-war camps. Stalag is a contraction of "Stammlager", itself short for Kriegsgefangenen-Mannschafts-Stammlager.- Legal definitions :...

 17B in Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

. (Trzcinski appears in the film as a prisoner.) The play was directed by José Ferrer
José Ferrer
José Vicente Ferrer de Otero y Cintrón , best known as José Ferrer, was a Puerto Rican actor, as well as a theater and film director...

 and was the Broadway debut of John Ericson
John Ericson (Actor)
John Ericson is a German-American actor and film and television star....

 as Sefton. It began its run in May 1951, continued for 472 performances and was based on the experiences of its authors. The character Sefton was loosely based on Joe Palazzo, a flyer in Edmund Trzcinski
Edmund Trzcinski
Edmund Trzcinski was an American playwright who was born in The Bronx, New York City, New York and died in Manhattan. An enlisted member of the 8th Air Force his airplane was shot down over Germany and he was sent to Luft Stalag 17B...

 prisoner of war barracks.

Plot

Stalag 17 begins on "the longest night of the year" in 1944 in a Luftwaffe prisoner-of-war camp
Stalag
In Germany, stalag was a term used for prisoner-of-war camps. Stalag is a contraction of "Stammlager", itself short for Kriegsgefangenen-Mannschafts-Stammlager.- Legal definitions :...

 located somewhere along the Danube River
Danube
The Danube is a river in the Central Europe and the Europe's second longest river after the Volga. It is classified as an international waterway....

. The story of a Nazi spy in Barracks Four is narrated by Clarence Harvey "Cookie" Cook (Gil Stratton). The camp holds Poles, Czechs, Russian females and in the American compound 640 sergeants, enlisted men from bomber crews, gunners, radiomen and flight engineers.

Prisoners of War Manfredi and Johnson try to escape through a tunnel
Escape tunnel
An escape tunnel is a form of secret passage used as part of an escape from siege or captivity. In medieval times such tunnels are usually constructed by the builders of castles or palaces who wish to have an escape route if their domain is under attack...

 the inmates have dug under the barbed wire
Barbed wire
Barbed wire, also known as barb wire , is a type of fencing wire constructed with sharp edges or points arranged at intervals along the strand. It is used to construct inexpensive fences and is used atop walls surrounding secured property...

. They are immediately shot by waiting prison guards when they emerge outside the fence. The other prisoners conclude that one of their own must have informed the Germans of the escape attempt, and suspicion falls on Sefton (William Holden
William Holden
William Holden was an American actor. Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1954 and the Emmy Award for Best Actor in 1974...

), a cynical and somewhat antisocial prisoner who barters openly with the German guards for eggs, silk stockings, blankets and other luxuries. He also organizes mouse races and various other profitable enterprises that net him his hoard of "luxuries." The other prisoners are suspicious of his fraternization with the enemy, though envious of his dealmaking success — for instance, he wins a large number of cigarettes from the other prisoners by betting against Manfredi's and Johnson's successful escape, then trades the cigarettes to the Germans for an egg the next morning.

The lives of the prisoners are depicted: they receive mail, eat terrible food, wash in the latrine sinks, and collectively do their best to keep sane and defy the camp's cruel and ruthless commandant, Oberst
Oberst
Oberst is a military rank in several German-speaking and Scandinavian countries, equivalent to Colonel. It is currently used by both the ground and air forces of Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Denmark and Norway. The Swedish rank överste is a direct translation, as are the Finnish rank eversti...

 von Scherbach (Otto Preminger
Otto Preminger
Otto Ludwig Preminger was an Austro–Hungarian-American theatre and film director.After moving from the theatre to Hollywood, he directed over 35 feature films in a five-decade career. He rose to prominence for stylish film noir mysteries such as Laura and Fallen Angel...

). They use a clandestine radio, smuggled from barracks to barracks throughout the entire camp, to pick up the BBC and the war news. (The antenna is their volleyball net.) Their German guard, Sergeant Schulz (Sig Ruman
Sig Ruman
Sig Ruman was a German-American actor known for his comic portrayals of pompous villains.-Life and career:...

), confiscates the radio - another success for the "stoolie".

Humor is seen in "Animal" Kasava's infatuation of movie actress, Betty Grable
Betty Grable
Elizabeth Ruth "Betty" Grable was an American actress, dancer and singer.Her iconic bathing suit photo made her the number-one pin-up girl of the World War II era. It was later included in the LIFE magazine project "100 Photos that Changed the World"...

. He suffers from depression when he learns Betty has married a bandleader, (Harry James
Harry James
Henry Haag “Harry” James was a trumpeter who led a jazz swing band during the Big Band Era of the 1930s and 1940s. He was especially known among musicians for his astonishing technical proficiency as well as his superior tone.-Biography:He was born in Albany, Georgia, the son of a bandleader of a...

). Harry "Sugar Lips" Shapiro get six letters at mail call, and makes Animal think they are from women. When Kasava sees a finance company letterhead, Harry admits they repossessed his Plymouth
Plymouth (automobile)
Plymouth was a marque of automobile based in the United States, produced by the Chrysler Corporation and its successor DaimlerChrysler.-Origins:...

.

Sefton bribes the guards to let him spend the day in the women's barracks in the Russian section of the camp. The other prisoners spot him through Sefton's own telescope (he had earlier charged each of them a fee in cigarettes for a brief glimpse of the women's shower area), and conclude that this is his reward for having informed the Germans about the radio. When he returns, he is accused of being a spy. At that moment, von Scherbach pays a visit to the barracks to apprehend new prisoner Lieutenant James Schuyler Dunbar (Don Taylor
Don Taylor (actor)
Don Taylor was an American movie actor and director best known for his performances in 1950s classics like Stalag 17 and Father of the Bride and the 1948 film noir The Naked City...

), who had previously told the other prisoners that he had blown up a German ammunition train while he was being transported to the camp. Sefton knows Dunbar comes from a wealthy Boston family. Sefton washed out of pilot training in the class Dunbar graduated from. Sefton feels Dunbar was commissioned due to family influence. The men are convinced that Sefton divulged Dunbar's act of sabotage to the Germans, and they viciously beat Sefton, after which he is ostracized. His considerable property is taken and redistributed to the rest of the prisoners. Sefton then decides to investigate and uncover the identity of the spy in order to clear his name. Eventually he remains in the barracks during a fake air raid and successfully discovers the identity of the spy: the barracks security chief, Price (Peter Graves
Peter Graves (actor)
Peter Aurness , known professionally as Peter Graves, was an American film and television actor. He was best known for his starring role in the CBS television series Mission: Impossible from 1967 to 1973...

), whom Sefton overhears conversing with Schulz in German and divulging the means by which Dunbar destroyed the ammunition train.

Sefton divulges the theory to his only friend in the camp, Cookie. He points out that the stoolie may not be an American traitor at all but a German spy posing as an American to ferret out information. However if he reveals and proves Price is the stoolie the Germans would simply remove him and put him in another camp.

On Christmas Day, the men find out that SS
Schutzstaffel
The Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...

 men are coming to take Dunbar to Berlin for interrogation. The entire camp creates a distraction and Dunbar is freed and hidden. Nobody but the compound chief Hoffy (Richard Erdman
Richard Erdman
Richard Erdman is an American film and television actor and director.-Notable roles:...

) knows of Dunbar's whereabouts, and he refuses to divulge the information to anybody, even the supposedly trustworthy Price. Dunbar is thus successfully kept from the Germans despite extensive search efforts. After von Scherbach threatens to raze the camp to find Dunbar, the men decide one of them must help Dunbar escape. Price volunteers for the job, and when he appears to have convinced the other prisoners to let him do it, Sefton reveals him as the spy. After accusing Price, Sefton asks him "When was Pearl Harbor
Attack on Pearl Harbor
The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike conducted by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on the morning of December 7, 1941...

?" Price knows the date, but Sefton traps him by quickly asking what time he heard the news. Without thinking, Price betrays himself by answering 6 p.m. — the correct time of the attack in Berlin, Germany, and not Cleveland, Ohio where he claims to have come from. After that, Sefton reaches into Price's jacket pocket and extracts the "mailbox" used to exchange messages with the Germans, a hollowed-out black chess queen.

With his fellow POWs
Prisoner of war
A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...

 convinced of Price's guilt, Sefton decides to take Dunbar out of the camp himself, first because he likes the odds of escape and second for the reward he can expect from Dunbar's wealthy family. The men give Sefton enough time to get Dunbar out of his hiding place (the water tower above one of the camp latrines) then throw Price out into the yard with tin cans tied to his legs. The ruse works: Price is killed in a hail of bullets (to the later consternation of von Scherbach and Schulz) by camp guards who believe him to be Dunbar or one of the other prisoners, creating a distraction that allows Sefton and Dunbar to cut through the barbed wire and make their escape. Everyone begins to wonder if Sefton or Dunbar will ever make it out of Germany alive. Animal says, "Maybe he just wanted to steal our wire cutters. You ever think of that? " The film ends with Cookie whistling "When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again."

Cast

  • William Holden
    William Holden
    William Holden was an American actor. Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1954 and the Emmy Award for Best Actor in 1974...

     as J.J. Sefton
  • Don Taylor
    Don Taylor (actor)
    Don Taylor was an American movie actor and director best known for his performances in 1950s classics like Stalag 17 and Father of the Bride and the 1948 film noir The Naked City...

     as Lieutenant Dunbar
  • Otto Preminger
    Otto Preminger
    Otto Ludwig Preminger was an Austro–Hungarian-American theatre and film director.After moving from the theatre to Hollywood, he directed over 35 feature films in a five-decade career. He rose to prominence for stylish film noir mysteries such as Laura and Fallen Angel...

     as Von Scherbach
  • Robert Strauss
    Robert Strauss (actor)
    Robert Strauss was a gravel-voiced American actor.-Career:Strauss began his career as a classical actor, appearing in The Tempest and Macbeth on Broadway in 1930...

     as Stanislas "Animal" Kasava
  • Harvey Lembeck
    Harvey Lembeck
    Harvey Lembeck was an American comedic actor best remembered for his role as Cpl. Rocco Barbella on The Phil Silvers Show in the late 1950s, and as the stumbling, overconfident outlaw biker Eric Von Zipper in the beach party movie series during the 1960s...

     as Harry Shapiro
  • Peter Graves
    Peter Graves (actor)
    Peter Aurness , known professionally as Peter Graves, was an American film and television actor. He was best known for his starring role in the CBS television series Mission: Impossible from 1967 to 1973...

     as Price
  • Sig Ruman
    Sig Ruman
    Sig Ruman was a German-American actor known for his comic portrayals of pompous villains.-Life and career:...

     as Sergeant Johann Sebastian Schulz
  • Neville Brand
    Neville Brand
    Neville Brand was an American television and movie actor.-Early life:Neville Brand was born in Illinois. He was born to Leo and Helen Brand as one of seven children. Leo, was an electrician and bridge building steel worker in Detroit, where Neville was raised...

     as Duke
  • Richard Erdman
    Richard Erdman
    Richard Erdman is an American film and television actor and director.-Notable roles:...

     as Hoffy
  • Michael Moore as Manfredi
  • Peter Baldwin
    Peter Baldwin (director)
    Peter Baldwin is an American actor and director of film and television.Baldwin started his career as a contract player at Paramount Studios. He played the character Johnson in Stalag 17. He eventually became a television director with an extensive résumé. As well as directing all of the episode's...

     as Johnson
  • Robinson Stone as Joey
  • Robert Shawley as Blondie Peterson
  • William Pierson
    William Pierson
    William Pierson was an American television, motion picture and stage actor, best known for his raspy voice and his role as Marko the Mailman in the film Stalag 17.-Biographical Sketch:...

     as Marko
  • Gil Stratton as Clarence Harvey "Cookie" Cook (Narrator)
  • Jay Lawrence
    Jay Lawrence
    Jay Lawrence was an American stand up comedian, TV and film actor and voice over actor, and the younger brother ofstand-up comedian and television sitcom/voice over actor Larry Storch.-Early life:...

     as Bagradian
  • Erwin Kalser as Geneva Man
  • Paul Salata
    Paul Salata
    Paul Thomas Salata is a former professional American football wide receiver in the National Football League and the All-America Football Conference . He played for the AAFC/NFL's San Francisco 49ers and the AAFC's Baltimore Colts...

     as Prisoner with Beard

Casting

Both Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston was an American actor of film, theatre and television. Heston is known for heroic roles in films such as The Ten Commandments, Ben-Hur for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor, El Cid, and Planet of the Apes...

 and Kirk Douglas
Kirk Douglas
Kirk Douglas is an American stage and film actor, film producer and author. His popular films include Out of the Past , Champion , Ace in the Hole , The Bad and the Beautiful , Lust for Life , Paths of Glory , Gunfight at the O.K...

 were considered for the role of Sefton. Holden was reluctant to play Sefton as he thought the character was too cynical and selfish. Wilder refused to make the role more sympathetic and Holden actually refused it, but was forced to do it by Paramount.

Location

The prison camp set was built on the John Show Ranch in Woodland Hills (not Calabasas as is commonly claimed), on the southwestern edge of the San Fernando Valley, for a shoot beginning during February, the rainy season in California (providing plenty of mud for the camp compound). It is now the location of a meetinghouse of the LDS Church in Woodland Hills.

Reception

The film was well received and is considered, along with The Great Escape
The Great Escape (film)
The Great Escape is a 1963 American film about an escape by Allied prisoners of war from a German POW camp during World War II, starring Steve McQueen, James Garner, and Richard Attenborough...

and The Bridge on the River Kwai
The Bridge on the River Kwai
The Bridge on the River Kwai is a 1957 British World War II film by David Lean based on The Bridge over the River Kwai by French writer Pierre Boulle. The film is a work of fiction but borrows the construction of the Burma Railway in 1942–43 for its historical setting. It stars William...

(also starring Holden), among the greatest World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 Prisoner of War
Prisoner of war
A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...

 films. Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther was a journalist and author who was film critic for The New York Times for 27 years. His reviews and articles helped shape the careers of actors, directors and screenwriters, though his reviews, at times, were unnecessarily mean...

 praised the film, calling it "cracker jack movie entertainment." More recently, film critic James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli is an American online film critic.-Personal life:Berardinelli was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey and spent his early childhood in Morristown, New Jersey. At the age of nine years, he relocated to the township of Cherry Hill, New Jersey...

 stated that "among the 20th century directors, few were more versatile than Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder was an Austro-Hungarian born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist, and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age...

." Currently, the film has a 97% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...

, based on 30 reviews.

Awards and nominations

Holden won the Academy Award
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...

 for Best Actor in a Leading Role
Academy Award for Best Actor
Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry...

. His acceptance speech was the shortest on record ("Thank you"), until Alfred Hitchcock
Alfred Hitchcock
Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock, KBE was a British film director and producer. He pioneered many techniques in the suspense and psychological thriller genres. After a successful career in British cinema in both silent films and early talkies, Hitchcock moved to Hollywood...

 said "Thanks" upon receiving an honorary Oscar in 1968. Holden's speech was not planned to be brief; by the time he received his Oscar, the show was running long — and the TV broadcast had a strict cutoff time — which forced Holden's quick remarks. Frustrated, Holden personally paid for advertisements in the Hollywood trade publications to thank everyone he wanted to on Oscar night.

In addition, Wilder was nominated for the Best Director Oscar, and Strauss for Best Supporting Actor
Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor
Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry. Since its inception, however, the...

.
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