Claus von Stauffenberg, played by Tom Cruise in a new movie, was executed in 1944 after a bomb that he placed almost killed Hitler. His son Berthold explains how his father almost changed history. Somewhat tiresomely for the subject of this interview, we will begin with Tom Cruise. Right at this moment the bouncy 45-year-old American Scientologist is trussed up in eye-patch and replica German army officer uniform, circa 1944, in the process of completing his own cinematic tribute to Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, the best-known member of the Nazi resistance.
Stauffenberg’s oldest son, Berthold, who turned 73 last month and was 10 when his father was shot for having tried and failed to assassinate Adolf Hitler with a bomb in a briefcase, has already spoken out about what he thinks about Cruise’s decision to direct his interpretive gaze towards his father – whether or not Cruise practised for the part by parading in uniform in a suite of the Regent Hotel in Berlin, which he has hired for the duration of filming. Cruise “should go surfing in the Caribbeanâ€.
Today, when the actor’s name surfaces, the younger Stauffenberg first pauses for several seconds, then breaks his own silence with a disparaging: “I’ve heard he is quite small.â€
Stauffenberg was, of course, notably tall, not as tall as his firstborn son, who at over 6ft 3in looms while remaining seated in an armchair, but still tall, extremely handsome and charismatic even in photographs. One suspects that the “good Nazi’s†startling looks – he was described by his contemporary Colonel General Franz Halder as “magnetically attractive†– as well as his intellectual and social pedigree, his vision and bravery, helped to draw Cruise to the role. Still, this father’s son is doubtful.
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