Leon Askin

Leon Askin was an Austrian-born actor whose career spanned stage, film, and television on both sides of the Atlantic. Born Leo Aschkenasy into a Jewish family in Vienna, Austria-Hungary, on September 18, 1907, he came of age in a city that would shape his artistic sensibilities and later threaten his life. His parents, Malvine (née Susman) and Samuel Aschkenasy, were murdered at the Treblinka extermination camp during the Holocaust. Askin's earliest encounter with performance came during World War I, when as a child he recited a poem before Emperor Franz Joseph. He made his professional acting debut in Vienna in 1926 in The Dutch Merchant, and in the 1920s studied the craft under Louise Dumont and Max Reinhardt. During the 1930s he directed politically charged works by playwright Jura Soyfer at Vienna's ABC cabaret theater.

Persecution by the Sturmabteilung and Schutzstaffel forced Askin to flee Austria in 1940, and he emigrated to the United States. During World War II he served as a staff sergeant in the United States Army Air Forces. Following the war he established himself in Hollywood, where he was frequently cast as foreign characters with thick accents. His film work included the role of Abidor, a Syrian guide, in The Robe (1953), and a key supporting part in Billy Wilder's political satire One, Two, Three (1961), alongside James Cagney. He also appeared as Anton Rubinstein in a Disneyland television episode about Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, and featured in Adventures of Superman as a diamond smuggler in the 1953 episode Superman in Exile and later as a South American leader in a color episode of the same series. His television guest appearances included The Restless Gun (1957), My Favorite Martian (1965), The Monkees (1967), Daniel Boone (1969), Paul Sand in Friends and Lovers (1974), Happy Days (1978), and Three's Company (1979). Between 1977 and 1979 he appeared on PBS's Meeting of Minds, portraying both Martin Luther and Karl Marx. He had a brief appearance as a Moscow news anchor in Airplane II: The Sequel (1982), and was cast in Mel Brooks' Young Frankenstein (1974), though his scenes were cut from the final version.

Askin's most recognized role came in the sitcom Hogan's Heroes, which ran from 1965 to 1971. He portrayed General Albert Burkhalter across 67 episodes, playing the stern superior officer to the inept Colonel Klink and a frequent target of manipulation by the POW characters. The role established him as a recognizable presence in North American popular culture.

His Broadway career ran from 1948 to 1950. He played Mr. Prince in A Temporary Island (1948) and Second Beard in Twentieth Century (1950), both performed in New York. Askin was originally from Vienna, Austria, and the city remained a significant part of his identity throughout his life.

Over the course of his career Askin received numerous honors from Austria. These included the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art in 1988, the Silver Medal for Service to the City of Vienna in 1994, the title of professor in 1996, the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art First Class in 2001, the Gold Medal of Honour for Services to the City of Vienna in 2002, and the Goldener Rathausmann of Vienna in 2003 to mark the 75th anniversary of his career. After his death, Leon-Askin-Platz in Vienna-Penzing was named in his honor in 2007, a bust was placed in Türkenschanzpark that same year, and a plaque was unveiled at Hütteldorferstrasse 349 to mark the centenary of his birth. In 2009 a public housing block at Sechsschimmelgasse 19 in Vienna-Alsergrund was named after him, and on May 27, 2010, Leon-Askin-Park at Grundsteingasse in Ottakring was dedicated in his name.

Askin died from natural causes in Vienna on June 3, 2005, at the age of 97, and is interred at Vienna Central Cemetery.