Eric Braeden

Eric Braeden (born Hans-Jörg Gudegast; April 3, 1941) is a German-American film and television actor, known for his roles as Victor Newman on the soap opera The Young and the Restless, as Hans Dietrich in the 1960s TV series The Rat Patrol, Dr. Charles Forbin in Colossus: The Forbin Project, and as John Jacob Astor IV in the 1997 film Titanic. He won a Daytime Emmy Award in 1998 for Lead Actor in a Drama Series for the role of Victor Newman. 2Early life Braeden was born Hans-Jörg Gudegast in Bredenbek, Germany (near Kiel), where his father was once mayor. He emigrated to the USA in 1959. In the United States, Braeden attended the University of Montana, Missoula 2Career Braeden accumulated many TV and film credits during his first two decades in America, and guest starred in 120 roles. His earliest credits were all under his birth name, Hans Gudegast. During the 1960s he appeared in several episodes of TV's longest-running World War II drama (1962–67) Combat!, always playing a German soldier. In 1965 he appeared in a film called Morituri starring Marlon Brando and Yul Brynner, and guest-starred in The Man From U.N.C.L.E. as T.H.R.U.S.H. agent Mr. Oakes in "The Discotheque Affair"; episode 5, season tw