Vladek Sheybal

Vladek Sheybal
Born	Władysław Sheybal 12 March 1923(1923-03-12) Zgierz, Poland
Died	16 October 1992 (aged 69) London, England, United Kingdom
Occupation	Actor

Vladek Sheybal (born Władysław Sheybal 12 March 1923 - 16 October 1992) was a Polish born character actor, whose career lasted from the 1950s into the 1980s. He is probably best known for his portrayal of the chess grandmaster Kronsteen in the 1963 James Bond film From Russia with Love, a role for which he had been personally recommended by his good friend Sean Connery. He was also well known for playing Russian General Bratchenko in Red Dawn. Sheybal excelled in playing cold, sinister villains.

He starred in the 1957 film Kanał, directed by Andrzej Wajda (credited as Wladyslaw Sheybal), before finding more lasting success in British films and television, usually cast in villainous roles. He also appeared as Holocaust survivor Egon Sobotnik in the landmark TV mini-series QB VII.

Other movie credits include: Casino Royale, Billion Dollar Brain, Deadfall, Mosquito Squadron, The Last Valley, Women in Love, The Boy Friend, The Wind and the Lion, The Lady Vanishes, The Apple and The Jigsaw Man.

TV credits include: Z-Cars, Danger Man, The Troubleshooters, The Saint, The Baron, The Champions, Callan, UFO (in which he had a recurring role as Dr. Jackson), The New Avengers, The Supernatural, Shogun, Lord Mountbatten: The Last Viceroy, and Smiley's People (1982).

In 1977 Sheybal won the 'Dracula Society's' prestigious 'Hamilton Deane Award' for his performance in the BBC play 'Night Of The Marionettes' in which he played a sinister Austrian innkeeper whose life-size puppets were purported to have inspired Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Other recipients have included Guillermo del Toro and Christopher Lee.

He died in 1992 from a ruptured aortic aneurysm and was buried in Putney Vale Cemetery.^[1]

References

1. ^ "Vladek Sheybal". British Film Institute. http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/individual/21596. Retrieved 2009-05-29. 

External links

• Vladek Sheybal at the Internet Movie Database
• An article about Vladek Sheybal
• Internet homepage of the Dracula Society