Darkly handsome, Austrian-born Maximilian Schell began his career in Germany, where he appeared in a number of films before making his Hollywood debut as a Nazi officer in Edward Dmytryk's "The Young Lions" (1958). He returned repeatedly to World War II and its aftermath, becoming arguably the most recognized "German" actor in American films. Best-remembered for his powerful Oscar-winning turn as a relentless defense attorney in Stanley Kramer's "Judgment at Nuremberg" (1961), a role he had originated in the "Playhouse 90" (1959) original, he won his second Best Actor Oscar nomination for his brilliant portrayal of an Adolph Eichmann-inspired Arthur Goldman in "The Man in the Glass Booth" (1975). An insane Nazi war criminal in Vittorio De Sica's "The Condemned of Altona" (1962), not to mention one sought by Jon Voight in "The Odessa File" (1974), he also played German officers in "Counterpoint" (1967), "A Bridge Too Far", "Cross of Iron" (both 1977) and "The Assisi Underground" (1985).

Outside the WWII motif, Schell was surprisingly tongue-in-cheek as a master jewel thief in the splendid "Topkapi" (1964) and even ventured into sci-fi as a suitably unsubtle mad scientist in "The Black Hole" (1979). However, movies like "Julia" (1977), featuring his Oscar-nominated supporting performance as an anti-fascist friend of Vanessa Redgrave in 1930s Europe, and "The Rose Garden" (1989), a contemporary courtroom drama in which he delivered an unmannered, touching portrait of an anguished man accused of attacking a senior citizen he correctly recognized as an SS commander responsible for his sister's murder, still elicited his best work. Schell's Jewish intellectual provided an interesting contrast to Rod Steiger's orthodox rabbi in "The Chosen" (1981), a first-rate adaptation of Chaim Potok's novel, and he displayed impressive emotional range in "Little Odessa" (1994) as the rancorous Russian father of hit-man Tim Roth, grief-stricken over his wife's (Redgrave) battle with a brain tumor. "Deep Impact" matched him again with Redgrave, this time as the ex-husband who had abandoned her for the charms of a younger woman, and he also appeared as Catholic clergymen in both "The Eighteenth Angel" and "John Carpenter's Vampires" (all 1998).

Schell produced and starred in the 1968 adaptation of Franz Kafka's "The Castle" before graduating to full-blown auteur as director of "First Love" (1970), which he co-adapted from a story by Turgenev (as well as produced). The original, often moving story of young lovers, starring Dominique Sanda and John Moulder-Brown (and the director as Sanda's father), earned an Oscar nomination as Best Foreign Film, as did his next outing, "The Pedestrian" (1973). This time, the writer-producer-director revisited familiar terrain, telling the tale of a leading German industrialist exposed by a muckraking local newspaper as having ordered the massacre of a Greek village during the war, to which he contributed a fine performance as the accusatory son. Schell co-wrote "The End of the Game" (1976) with Friedrich Durrenmatt (from Durrenmatt's novel), helming the complex thriller about a dying police chief (played by director Martin Ritt) who has been trying for three decades to nail an omnipotent criminal (Robert Shaw). Following his well-received "Tales from the Vienna Woods/Geschichten aus dem Wiener Wald" (1979), he concluded his auteurship with the fascinating Oscar-nominated documentary, "Marlene" (1984), centered on an "interview" with Marlene Dietrich, in which the legendary star (who refused to appear on camera) continued to stage-manage her career with a combination of charm, guile and deliberate obfuscation.

Those who are not familiar with his feature work may know him from his impressive body of TV credits in the 80s and 90s, beginning with his portrayal of Otto Frank in the NBC remake of "The Diary of Anne Frank" (1980). Schell painted a dandy scenery-chewing portrait of "The Phantom of the Opera" (CBS, 1983), was magnificent as "Peter the Great" in the 1986 Emmy-winning NBC miniseries and played Frederick the Great to Redgrave's Empress Elizabeth in "Young Catherine" (TNT, 1991). He bore an uncanny resemblance to Lenin in the HBO miniseries "Stalin" and garnered an Emmy nomination as Mordecai in the NBC "Hallmark Hall of Fame" presentation of "Miss Rose White" (both 1992). Some might remember him for his portrayal of Amado Guzman during the last season of "Wiseguy" (CBS, 1990), his only foray in series television, and he also appeared as Pharaoh in the TNT movie "Abraham" (1994) and as Cardinal Vittorio in the CBS miniseries "The Thorn Birds: The Missing Years" (1996). After a decade's absence from the director's chair, Schell helmed the Family Channel's "Candles in the Wind" (1993) but asked to have his name removed from the credits. This man of conscience continues to lend his dynamic presence to both the large and small screens, showing no signs of slowing up.