Ferdy Mayne; Character Actor in Films, on TV

Ferdy Mayne, German-born international character actor remembered by American audiences for his work in such motion pictures as “Ben Hur” and “Fearless Vampire Killers” and the television miniseries “Winds of War,” has died. He was 81.

Mayne died Jan. 30 in London of complications of Parkinson’s disease.

The actor began his career in the 1940s, usually playing a suave villain in B movies, and over his half-century career appeared in about 150 films.

Although he was a Jewish refugee from Germany, he was often sought to play Nazi roles. His German was so good that the British Broadcasting Co. employed him during World War II for propaganda broadcasts to Germany and later sent him to the Nuremberg trials as special correspondent.

Born Ferdinand Mayer-Horckel in Mayence, Germany, Mayne was the son of a German Jewish judge and a half-English mother. As the Nazis gained power, he was sent to England to stay with his British aunt in 1932.

Mayne studied for the stage at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and the Old Vic School, and made his debut as the white knight in “Alice Through the Looking Glass” with the West Croydon Repertory Company.

In 1943, he made his initial appearance in London’s West End as the German Kurt Muller in Lillian Hellman’s anti-Fascist play “Watch on the Rhine.”

That same year, Mayne made his film debut in “Old Mother Riley Overseas.”

Over the years, he was the sea captain who rescued Charlton Heston from a shipwreck in “Ben Hur,” a silken-voiced vampire in Roman Polanski’s parody of Dracula called “Fearless Vampire Killers,” and a favorite character in many horror films. The multifaceted actor also sang in such musicals as “No Strings” and “The Sound of Music”

Living in Hollywood in the 1970s and 1980s, Mayne worked frequently on the small screen, appearing in such series as “Hart to Hart,” “Cagney & Lacy” and “Dynasty.”

In 1983, he portrayed a rich Jew in the critically acclaimed miniseries “Winds of War,” which starred Robert Mitchum.

Mayne is survived by two daughters, Belinda and Fernanda.