John Steiner

John Steiner (born 7 January 1941 in Chester, Cheshire) is an English actor. Tall, thin and gaunt, Steiner attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts and worked for a few years at the BBC. Steiner featured in a lead role in a television production of Design for Living by Noël Coward. Later he found further work primarily in films including Marat/Sade (1967), and the original Bedazzled (1967) with Peter Cook and Dudley Moore. In 1969, Steiner was hired to play a part in the spaghetti western Tepepa, and also appeared opposite Franco Nero in White Fang, directed by Lucio Fulci. He found himself in demand in Italy and moved there, appearing in a great number of Italian exploitation and B-films including police actioners (Violent Rome), westerns (Mannaja), war films (The Last Hunter), nazisploitation (Deported Women of the SS Special Section), sci-fi adventure films (Yor, the Hunter from the Future), and horror films, such as Mario Bava's Shock, Dario Argento's Tenebrae, and Ruggero Deodato's Body Count. He also became a favourite of famed Italian filmmaker Tinto Brass, featuring in Salon Kitty, the infamous Caligula, Action, and Paprika.
Steiner was in very steady demand until the late 1980s. As the Italian film industry dwindled, Steiner retired from acting in 1991 and moved to California, where he became an real estate agent.
Steiner has recently contributed to DVD extras on some of his films and given interviews about his Italian work.