Voices of the Spaghetti Western ~ “For a Few Dollars Less”

As we know most of the Euro-westerns were co-productions from Italy, Spain, Germany and France which incorporated British and American actors to gain a worldwide audience. The films were shot silent and then dubbed into the various languages where they were sold for distribution. That means Italian, Spanish, German, French and English voice actors were hired to dub the films. Even actors from the countries where the film was to be shown were often dubbed by voice actors for various reasons such as the actors were already busy making another film, they wanted to be paid additional salaries for dubbing their voices, the actor’s voice didn’t fit the character they were playing, accidents to the actors and in some cases even death before the film could be dubbed.

I’ll list a Euro-western and the (I) Italian, (S) Spanish, (G) German and (F) French, (E) English voices that I can find and once in a while a bio on a specific voice actor as in Europe these actors are as well-known as the actors they voiced.

Today we’ll cover “For a Few Dollars Less”

[(I) Italian, (S) Spanish, (G) German, (F) French, (E) English]

Bill – Lando Buzzanca (I) Lando Buzzanca, (G) Tim Hoffmann

Miguel – Elio Pandolfi (I) Elio Pandolfi, (G) Helmut Müller-Lankow

Juanita – Gloria Paul (I) ? (G) Ute Lubosch

Sally – Lucia Modugno (I) Lucia Modugno, (G) Roswitha Hirsch

Little Joe – Tony Renis (I) Luciano Melani, (G) ?

Calamity John - Carlo Pisacane (I) Stefano Sibladi. (G) ?

Helmut Müller-Lankow  (1928 – 2006)

German actor and voice dubber was born in Weimar, Germany on April 19, 1928. He learned the profession of acting at the Weimar Theatre Institute (1951–1954) and made his stage debut in Erfurt in 1953. Numerous theatre appearances followed, before he found a permanent place in the ensemble of the Maxim Gorki Theatre in 1956. For over thirty years he played on this Berlin stage and became known as a character actor throughout the GDR. In addition, Müller-Lankow also took on several roles in film and television. Helmut worked extensively in the dubbing of foreign films and dubbed Philippe Noiret, Jean Marais and Peter Butterworth for DEFA, among others. He achieved particular popularity as the voice actor of Kjeld (Poul Bundgaard) in “The Olsen Gang Goes to Jutland”, the third film about the unsuccessful Danish trio of crooks. Already in the second film, “The Olsen Gang in a Pinch”, he had voiced another leading role with Dynamite Harry (Preben Kaas). Even after German reunification, Müller-Lankow remained active as a dubbing actor, including as Dr. Marcus Welby (Robert Young) in later episodes of the series of the same name. He also voiced the role of family man Geba in the Hungarian animated series ‘Hot Wire to the Afterlife’. Helmut died in Berlin on March 8, 2006.