Andréas Voutsinas

Biography

Andreas Voutsinas (22 August 1930 – 8 June 2010) was a Greek actor and theatre director. In the English-speaking world, he was best known for his roles in three Mel Brooks films, The Producers (1967), The Twelve Chairs (1970) and History of the World, Part I (1981).

Voutsinas was born on 22 August 1930 in Khartoum, since there was a sizeable community of Greek settlers in Sudan at the time. His parents came from the island of Cephalonia, Greece. They set up a pasta factory in the Anglo-Egyptian colony, "reputedly supplying spaghetti to Italian forces" during the Fascist invasion of Abyssinia. After the collapse of the business during WWII, Voutsinas moved with his mother to Athens, Greece....