Erich von Stroheim (September 22, 1885 – May 12, 1957) was an Austrian-American director, actor and producer, most notable as being a film star of the silent era, subsequently noted as an auteur for his directorial work.
Stroheim was born in Vienna, Austria, in 1885 as Erich Oswald Stroheim, the son of Benno Stroheim, a middle-class hat-maker, and Johanna Bondy, both of whom were observant Jews.
Stroheim emigrated to America at the end of 1909. On arrival at Ellis Island, he claimed to be Count Erich Oswald Hans Carl Maria von Stroheim und Nordenwall, the son of Austrian nobility like the characters he played in his films, but both Billy Wilder and Stroheim's agent Paul Kohner claimed that he spoke with a decidedly lower-class Austrian accent. Jean Renoir writes in his memoirs: “Stroheim spoke hardly any German. He had to study his lines like a schoolboy learning a foreign language.” Later, while living in Europe, Stroheim claimed in published remarks to have "forgotten" his native tongue. In Renoir's movie la Grande Illusion, Stroheim speaks German with a strong American accent.