Variety in the summer of 1927 noted that some four hundred aliens were working as actors or in other creative positions in Hollywood, and that more than half of all leading roles were taken by performers of foreign birth. Pola Negri, Vilma Banky, Lya de Putti, Emil Jannings, Joseph Schildkraut, Conrad Veidt, and many others from Germany or central Europe were big stars, but only so long as the public couldn’t hear their accents. Universal and Paramount were both dominated by German stars and directors. Universal was said, only half in jest, to have German as its official language.
Silent movies and foreign actors
