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'{{Cleanup|date=November 2008}} '''Michael Romanoff''' (born '''Hershel Geguzin''') was a [[Hollywood]] [[restaurateur]] and [[actor]] born [[20 February]] [[1890]] in [[Lithuania]]. He died of a heart attack in [[Los Angeles, California|Los Angeles]], [[California]] on [[1 September]] [[1971]].<ref name="imdb.com">[http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0738985/bio Michael Romanoff biography page - IMDb.com]</ref> He is perhaps best known as the owner of '''Romanoff's''', a [[Beverly Hills]] restaurant popular with Hollywood stars in the 1940s and 1950s. The restaurant closed in the 1960s. According to ''U.S.A Confidential'' (Mortimer and Lait, 1952), while Romanoff pretended to be [[Russian royalty]], he was actually a former [[Brooklyn]] pants presser once named '''Harry Gerguson. His [[Internet Movie Database]] (IMDb.com) biography states: <blockquote>Mike Romanoff, the former Harry F. Gerguson, was a successful "professional impostor". He accumulated an enormous fount of knowledge in his numerous travels and occupations around the world (and he attended, however briefly, several leading universities). When Hollywood filmmakers needed a technical adviser for a movie set in Europe, Romanoff claimed to be an expert and drew a comfortable salary. The genial Romanoff was a popular figure among the movie colony, and he opened a restaurant that was frequented by many film stars. Romanoff made few screen appearances, but he can be seen in all his fraudulent glory in ''Sing While You're Able'' (1937). [[David Niven]] was a close friend, and in his book ''Bring on the Empty Horses'' he devotes a chapter to the colorful Romanoff. <ref name="imdb.com"/></blockquote> In April 1957, he was a mystery guest on the TV panel show ''[[What's My Line?]]''.<ref>{{cite web |work=TV.com |title=What's My Line?: Episode #358 |url=http://www.tv.com/whats-my-line/episode-356/episode/95744/summary.html?tag=episode_tabs;next |accessdate=2008-11-08}}</ref><ref>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogGkHgxcdCA&feature=related</ref> IMDb.com notes that Geguzin immigrated to [[New York City]] at age ten, changed his name to Harry F. Gerguson some time after 1900 and married Gloria Lister in 1948.<ref name="imdb.com"/> IMDb.com further explains that Romanoff "claimed to have been born '''Prince Michael Dimitri Alexandrovich Obolensky-Romanoff''', nephew of [[Nicholas II of Russia|Tsar Nicholas II]]. Everyone in Hollywood knew he wasn't, but in a town full of pretenders, it hardly mattered, and "Prince Michael" enjoyed great success as a restaurateur."<ref name="imdb.com"/> ''[[The New Yorker]]'' ran a series of four profiles, starting October 29, 1932, that traced his history from birth until date of publication. He was deported to France to serve time for fraud. At an early point in the original (1947) version of ''[[Miracle on 34th Street]]'' a doctor expresses the opinion that Kris Kringle (Edmund Gwenn) is of no harm to anyone despite his insistence that he is Santa Claus. He compares him to a well-known restaurant owner, whose name escapes him at the moment, who insists that he is a member of the Russian royal family but is otherwise quite normal. ==References== {{reflist}} ==Further reading== *Pejsa, Jane. ''Romanoff, Prince of Rogues'' Kenwood Publishing *''The New Yorker'', October 29, 1932 ==External links== *{{imdb name|name=Michael Romanoff|id=0738985}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Romanoff, Michael}} [[Category:American actors]] [[Category:Impostors]] [[Category:Restaurateurs]] [[fi:Michael Romanoff]]'