Walter Reisch

After completing studies in literature at the University of Vienna, Walter Reisch began his screen career as an extra and title writer in 1918. He eventually made the acquaintance of Stephan Lorant, a refuge from the Horty regime in Hungary, who, within a single year, had made a name for himself in Austrian films as a film maker and cinematographer. Lorant gave Reisch a break by promoting him as his assistant director on Die Narrenkappe der Liebe (1921). Reisch followed Lorant to Berlin -- then the artistic hub of Europe -- to work as his assistant cameraman. He subsequently continued on in the same capacity, working on documentary newsreeels in Switzerland. In 1925, Reisch returned to Austria to specialise as a scenarist. Before long, his growing reputation led the producer Erich Pommer to sign him to a contract with Germany's leading film company Ufa, where he had the opportunity to work alongside another gifted Viennese writer named Billy Wilder. Much of Reisch's work at this time