Curt Bois

Curt Bois (April 5, 1901 – December 25, 1991) was a German actor. He is best remembered for his performance as the pickpocket in Casablanca (1942). Bois was born in Berlin and began acting in 1907, becoming one of the film world's first child actors, with a role in the silent movie Bauernhaus und Grafenschloß. In 1909, he played the title role in Der Kleine Detektiv ('The Little Detective'). Bois performed in theatre, cabaret, musicals, silent films, and "talkies" over his long acting career. In 1934, the Jewish Bois was forced to leave his home in Nazi Germany for the United States, where he found work on stage on Broadway. By 1937, he had found his way to Hollywood and began acting in films, the best-known being Casablanca (1942), in which he warns a befuddled English gentleman to be on guard again pickpockets ("vultures everywhere") while stealing the man's wallet. After World War II, Bois decided it was safe to return to Germany, which he did in 1950. He finished his life and career in Germany, first in the East, and then in the West. Bois' acting career spanned eighty years. His final performance was in Der Himmel über Berlin (Wings of Desire, 1987). Bois died in Berlin, the city of his birth, at the age of ninety.