- According to Lang himself, on 25 March 1933, two days after The Testament of Dr. Mabuse (1933) had been banned, he was summoned to the Nazi Ministry of Propaganda to meet with Joseph Goebbels himself. Goebbels explained the reason for the ban (the Nazi party slogans are fed into the mouth of the villain at the film's conclusion) and apologized to Lang. He then shocked Lang by offering him the position of production supervisor at the UFA studios, where his first film would be a biography of Wilhelm Tell. Lang claims he suspected a trap and attempted to throw off Goebbels by telling him, "My mother had Jewish parents," to which Goebbels responded, "We'll decide who's Jewish!" Lang then expressed interest in the position and said he needed some time to think it over. He describes how he looked at a clock and how during the entire meeting all he could think about was leaving as soon as possible so he could get to the bank and flee with all of his money. Lang says he didn't get there in time so he sold his wife's jewelry, boarded a train to Paris that same evening, leaving most of his money and personal possessions behind, along with his wife, Thea von Harbou, who divorced him later that year and went on to write and direct films for the Nazi propaganda machine. This story is possibly exaggerated by Lang for dramatic effect because there is evidence he left weeks after that.
- His films, particularly his earlier work, were hugely influential and he was cited as influencing the work of directors such as Alfred Hitchcock, Luis Buñuel and Orson Welles.
- His first wife, Lisa Rosenthal, committed suicide by shooting herself in the chest. It was rumoured that she did this after finding her husband in a compromising situation with Thea von Harbou.
- Lang dubbed Peter Lorre's whistling in M (1931). He felt his off-key whistling was right for the character.
- He claims to have invented "the countdown" for dramatic purposes in his film Woman in the Moon (1929). His use of countdown is the first ever recorded, inspiring real life rocket launch sequences.
- Dorothy Parker once remarked, in reference to Lang's wife's "campaigning" for his career, "There's a man who got where he is by the sweat of his Frau."
- As a soldier in the Austro-Hungarian army during World War I - he was an Austrian, not German as is commonly believed - he fought in Russia and Romania, where he was wounded three times. He also fought in Italy, where he was also wounded, and wound up being commissioned as a lieutenant (he enlisted as a private).
- Both in Germany and the United States, he was one of the most personally disliked directors around, a fact that hurt him at times in Hollywood because some actresses and actors would refuse to work with him.
- His second wife, Thea von Harbou, divorced him after finding some evidence of his intimate relationship with Lily Latte, who was his contact in Paris during his visits and then his stay in France. Lilly was also married, and also divorced shortly after, having lived with Lang and serving as his personal assistant, from 1931-71, when they were married.
- Learned to speak French and English as an adult in addition to his native German.
- When he decided to leave Germany in 1933, his wife Thea von Harbou divorced him. She remained in Germany and made propaganda films for the Nazi regime.
- Was voted the 30th Greatest Director of all time by Entertainment Weekly.
- After a journey to America Lang returned to Germany to make what is probably his most famous work, Metropolis (1927). It was on this film that Lang acquired the reputation for being a "tyrant" on the set (even in the 1940s, long after he had settled in the US, many actors and actresses in Hollywood would refuse to work for him because of his abusive behavior on set).
- An extensive interview with Peter Bogdanovich resulted in a book, "Fritz Lang in America" published by Praesger in 1967.
- Unlike many silent-era directors, he welcomed the advent of sound, but didn't rush into it--while the sound era is generally agreed to have started in 1927, he didn't make a sound film until 1931, but it was one of his finest--M (1931). The film, a dark tale about a pedophile who molests and murders a little girl, was a smash international hit and made a star out of its lead, Peter Lorre. The film was especially meaningful to German audiences because of the recent cases of two serial-killing pedophiles, Peter Kurten and Fritz Haarman.
- President of the 'Official Competition' jury at the 17th Cannes International Film Festival in 1964.
- Interviewed in Peter Bogdanovich's "Who the Devil Made It: Conversations With Robert Aldrich, George Cukor, Allan Dwan, Howard Hawks, Alfred Hitchcock, Chuck Jones, Fritz Lang, Joseph H. Lewis, Sidney Lumet, Leo McCarey, Otto Preminger, Don Siegel, Josef von Sternberg, Frank Tashlin, Edgar G. Ulmer, Raoul Walsh." NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1997.
- Producer Erich Pommer offered Lang The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), but the director felt the film's expressionistic style would not be understood by audiences. Instead he did The Spiders - Episode 2: The Diamond Ship (1920), the last part of "The Spiders".
- He was known in Berlin as something of a "man of the world", and was often seen wearing a monocle, which was fashionable in those days.
- In his later years, Lang would say that, having left his native Austria and having lived in various lands, he thought of himself as a "cosmopolitan."But that the one place he felt truly at home was in the lobby of the French Cinematheque in Paris.
- He has directed two films that have been selected for the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically or aesthetically" significant: Fury (1936) and The Big Heat (1953).
- Before his death in 1976, he planned to make a film about the hippie culture.
- In 1918 he met producer Erich Pommer in Berlin, who hired him as an actor and scriptwriter.
- An animated version of Lang appeared in the Japanese animated movie "Full Metal Alchemist: Conquerors of Shamballa" (Fullmetal Alchemist the Movie: Conqueror of Shamballa (2005)). Originally mistaken by Edward Elric as being one of the Homonculi from his own world, this animated Lang aided Edward in his quest to return home. He was voiced by Hidekatsu Shibata.
- After he left Germany he made several pictures in France, then went to England and finally the US. It was there he helped found the Anti-Nazi League.
- Lang made only a few movies in the 1920s compared to other German directors, but the relative few he made are considered classics of film history.
- Lang was drafted into the Austro-Hungarian Imperial Army during WW I in 1915. As a lieutenant in Italy he was wounded in the shoulder, for which he was decorated.
- Collected primitive art.
- Was nearly blind at the time of his death.
- Interred at Forest Lawn (Hollywood Hills), Los Angeles, California, USA, in the Enduring Faith section, just to the right of plot #3818, two in from the curb.
- Second son of Anton Lang, an architect, and Pauline Schlesinger.
- After the outbreak of World War I he volunteered for the Austro-Hungarian army and was sent to the front of Russia, Romania and Italy, where he was wounded several times. He was awarded several medals for bravery. During his time in the military hospital he wrote his first scripts and one of them was very probably realized for the Stuart-Webbs serial of director Joe May. After 1917 May adapted several of Lang's scripts for Das rollende Hotel (1918), the follow-up to the successful "Joe Deebs" serial Sein schwierigster Fall (1915).
- Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume One, 1890-1945." Pages 609-624. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1987.
- Prior to World War I he had a keen interest in art. He often visited the Academy of Graphic Arts in Vienna and spent 1913 and 1914 as an artist in Paris, France.
- In 1933 Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels invited Lang to his office for a talk. Goebbels offered him the leadership of the German movie business. Lang told him he would need to think it over, and when he left the meeting he went directly to the train station and hopped a train to Paris, France.
- Was widely known to be a very private man, refusing to discuss anything about himself during interviews.
- Was interviewed by fellow director Peter Bogdanovich in 1967.
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