Howard Vernon

A prolific character actor, Vernon also worked with many other prominent filmmakers, notably Jean-Luc Godard, Jean-Pierre Melville, René Clément, Powell & Pressburger, Sacha Guitry, Fritz Lang, John Frankenheimer, Roger Vadim, Fred Zinnemann, Woody Allen and Jean-Pierre Jeunet. He was also active as a dubber.

Vernon was born Mario Walter Lippert in Baden-Baden, Baden-Württemberg, Germany to a Swiss hotelier, Julius Lippert, and a German mother, Doris (née Häffner). His family returned to Switzerland shortly after he was born, and he was raised in the canton of Aargau. He grew up in a trilingual household, and was fluent in French, German, and English. He studied acting in Berlin, where he made his stage acting debut in 1936. Back in Switzerland, he continued his studies under Erwin Kalser. Moving to Paris, France, he performed in theaters, cabarets, and music halls, notably the Casino de Paris. At the outbreak of World War II and the occupation of France, Vernon was employed by Fernsehsender Paris, the German-run television broadcaster, as he was bilingual and from a neutral country. In 1944, he moved to England and joined the BBC as a translator and broadcaster. He returned to Paris after the liberation of France.

Originally a stage and radio actor, he worked primarily in France and became a well-known supporting actor after 1945 by playing villainous Nazi officers in post-war French films. Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Silence de la mer, in which he played a gentle anti-Nazi German officer, made him somewhat famous but, in part due to his rough-hewn looks and Swiss accent, he was subsequently relegated to playing gangsters and heavies. He was nonetheless a favorite of Melville, who subsequently cast him in films. In the 1960s, he became a favorite actor of Spanish horror director Jesús Franco and began starring in many low-budget horror and erotic movies produced in Spain and France, often portraying a mad doctor or a sadist. He continued to make increasingly small appearances in high-profile films while often getting top billing in many Grade-Z low budget films. Horror film fans consider his three greatest horror roles to be The Awful Dr. Orloff (1962) which introduced Franco's famed mad doctor character, Dracula, Prisoner of Frankenstein (1972) in which he actually played Count Dracula, and The Erotic Rites of Frankenstein (1972) in which he played Count Cagliostro. Between his work with Franco, whom he came to consider a personal friend, he continued to appear in more high-profile projects, and was active as a dubber. He also remained active in the theatre.

Vernon was an avid photographer, and worked as a behind-the-scenes still photographer on several films in which he acted, credited under his birth name “Mario Lippert”.

Vernon died in the Issy-les-Moulineaux, district of Paris, 10 days after his 88th birthday.