Paul van Yperen's Blog, page 417
June 4, 2014
Roberto Risso
Italian actor Roberto Risso (1925-2010) is best known as the shy and upward policeman who falls in love with Gina Lollobrigida in the comedy Pane, amore e fantasia/Bread, Love and Dreams (1953).
Italian postcard by Rotalfoto, Milano, no. 443.
Ideal Boyfriend
Roberto Risso was the stage name of Pietro Roberto Strub, born in Geneva, Switzerland in 1925.
While still studying architecture, he made his film debut with a brief appearance in Il leone di Amalfi/The Lion of Amalfi (Pietro Francisci, 1950), starring Vittorio Gassman .
He got a bigger part in Domani è un altro giorno/Tomorrow is another day (Leonide Moguy, 1951), as the seducer of Anna Maria Pierangeli ( Pier Angeli ).
Thanks to his looks, he had a successful career as the ideal boyfriend in lightweight and sentimental films.
International success came with the classic romantic comedy Pane, amore e fantasia/Bread, Love and Dreams (Luigi Comencini, 1953), and the sequel Pane, amore e gelosia/Bread, Love and Jealousy (Luigi Comencini, 1954).
He played the role of Pietro Stelluti, a shy, awkward and upright carabiniere in a remote mountain village, in love with the light-hearted and bubbly Gina Lollobrigida . Both films were loved by the public and the critics alike.
Italian postcard in the series Divi del Cinema by Vetta Traldi, Milano, no. 74.
Remarkable ease and credibility
Roberto Risso continued his career with many films in which he appeared mostly as a character actor.
Among these films are the prostitution drama Donne proibite/Angels of Darkness (Giuseppe Amato, 1954) with Linda Darnell and Valentina Cortese , and the French thriller Bonnes à tuer/One Step to Eternity (Henri Decoin, 1954) starring Corinne Calvet .
His best film performance was probably in Una pelliccia di visone/A mink coat (Glauco Pellegrini, 1956).
He always played with remarkable ease and credibility such as in the Italian-British WW II thriller L'affondamento della Valiant/The Valiant (Roy Ward Baker, Giorgio Captiani, 1962) opposite John Mills .
Later, tired of the typecasting, he spent some time in film production.
In the late 1960s he retired from the cinema. His last film was the Spaghetti Western Odia il prossimo tuo/ Hate Thy Neighbor (Ferdinando Baldi, 1968), in which he credited Robert Rice.
That year, he was also a game contestant in the Rai TV show Domani è un altro giorno/Those on Sunday. On that occasion he declared that he had left the film industry to work in the fashion world.
In the course of the 1970s, he reappeared in some soap operas.
Roberto Risso died in Milan, Italy in 2010, six days before his eighty-fifth birthday. He was married to Mimma Ciurlo.
Italian postcard by Levibrom, Milano.
Sources: AllMovie, Wikipedia (Italian) and .
Italian postcard by Rotalfoto, Milano, no. 443.
Ideal Boyfriend
Roberto Risso was the stage name of Pietro Roberto Strub, born in Geneva, Switzerland in 1925.
While still studying architecture, he made his film debut with a brief appearance in Il leone di Amalfi/The Lion of Amalfi (Pietro Francisci, 1950), starring Vittorio Gassman .
He got a bigger part in Domani è un altro giorno/Tomorrow is another day (Leonide Moguy, 1951), as the seducer of Anna Maria Pierangeli ( Pier Angeli ).
Thanks to his looks, he had a successful career as the ideal boyfriend in lightweight and sentimental films.
International success came with the classic romantic comedy Pane, amore e fantasia/Bread, Love and Dreams (Luigi Comencini, 1953), and the sequel Pane, amore e gelosia/Bread, Love and Jealousy (Luigi Comencini, 1954).
He played the role of Pietro Stelluti, a shy, awkward and upright carabiniere in a remote mountain village, in love with the light-hearted and bubbly Gina Lollobrigida . Both films were loved by the public and the critics alike.
Italian postcard in the series Divi del Cinema by Vetta Traldi, Milano, no. 74.
Remarkable ease and credibility
Roberto Risso continued his career with many films in which he appeared mostly as a character actor.
Among these films are the prostitution drama Donne proibite/Angels of Darkness (Giuseppe Amato, 1954) with Linda Darnell and Valentina Cortese , and the French thriller Bonnes à tuer/One Step to Eternity (Henri Decoin, 1954) starring Corinne Calvet .
His best film performance was probably in Una pelliccia di visone/A mink coat (Glauco Pellegrini, 1956).
He always played with remarkable ease and credibility such as in the Italian-British WW II thriller L'affondamento della Valiant/The Valiant (Roy Ward Baker, Giorgio Captiani, 1962) opposite John Mills .
Later, tired of the typecasting, he spent some time in film production.
In the late 1960s he retired from the cinema. His last film was the Spaghetti Western Odia il prossimo tuo/ Hate Thy Neighbor (Ferdinando Baldi, 1968), in which he credited Robert Rice.
That year, he was also a game contestant in the Rai TV show Domani è un altro giorno/Those on Sunday. On that occasion he declared that he had left the film industry to work in the fashion world.
In the course of the 1970s, he reappeared in some soap operas.
Roberto Risso died in Milan, Italy in 2010, six days before his eighty-fifth birthday. He was married to Mimma Ciurlo.
Italian postcard by Levibrom, Milano.
Sources: AllMovie, Wikipedia (Italian) and .
June 3, 2014
Paul Meurisse
French actor Paul Meurisse (1912-1979) appeared in over 60 films and many stage productions. Meurisse was noted for the elegance of his acting style, and for his versatility. He was equally able to play comedic and serious dramatic roles. His screen appearances ranged from the droll and drily humorous to the menacing and disturbing. His most celebrated role was that of the sadistic and vindictive headmaster in the classic thriller Les Diaboliques/Diabolique (1955).
French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 168. Photo: Star.
French postcard by Editions O.P., Paris, no. 192. Photo: Star.
Intense portrayal of a psychopathic hoodlum
Paul Gustave Pierre Meurisse was born in Dunkirk, on the north-east coast of France, in 1912. He grew up on the island of Corsica, to where his bank manager father had been transferred when Meurisse was a small child.
After leaving school he moved to Aix-en-Provence, where he became a solicitor's clerk. His passion was for the stage, and he obtained evening work in the chorus of music hall revues.
In 1936, he left Aix for Paris, with a letter of recommendation signed by Huguette Duflos . Meurisse found work at once, at the Trianon first, and then at the ABC music hall in a show by realistic singer Marie Dubas. He also appeared in Pigalle nightclubs. He specialised in taking cheerful, upbeat songs and singing them in a comically downbeat, lugubrious fashion.
In 1939, Meurisse met Edith Piaf, and the two became lovers for several months. Piaf however did not see a future for Meurisse as a singer, and encouraged him to try his hand at acting instead. They appeared together in the play Le Bel indifferent (1939), written for them by Jean Cocteau.
Meurisse's first screen role came in Vingt-quatre heures de perm’/Twenty-four hours permit (Maurice Cloche, 1945), filmed in 1940 but not released until 1945. The comedy Ne bougez plus/Do not move (Pierre Caron, 1941) was the first of his films to be released.
With Piaf he co-starred in the dramatic comedy Montmartre-sur-Seine (Georges Lacombe, 1941). Like most of Piaf's impulsive romances, Meurisse was soon discarded, but he managed to do quite well for himself.
His breakthrough was as a gangster opposite Françoise Rosay in Macadam/Back Streets of Paris (Marcel Blistène, 1946). James Travers reviews at Films de France : “Meurisse's intense portrayal of a psychopathic hoodlum is arguably the best thing about this film, particularly as it captures something of the sadism and uncontrolled inner rage that Edward G. Robinson brought to his early gangster portrayals. Here Meurisse is partnered with Simone Signoret , a stunning newcomer who had yet to make her film breakthrough but who steals every scene she appears in with her barely contained sensuality and charisma, the archetypal femme fatale.”
Thereafter his acting services were always in demand: in 1948 for example he was credited in no fewer than seven films. Meurisse played a wide range of roles, from gangsters in films like Impasse des Deux-Anges/Impasse of Two Angels (Maurice Tourneur, 1948) to policemen in Inspecteur Sergil/Inspector Sergil (Jacques Daroy, 1947) and Le Dessous des cartes/Under the Cards (André Cayatte, 1948), from comedy in the Monocle films to historical in La contessa di Castiglione/The Contessa's Secret (Georges Combret, 1954) and L'Affaire des poisons/The Poison Affair (Henri Decoin, 1955).
The quality of the films was variable, but Meurisse's versatility meant that his performance was often considered the best part of an otherwise mediocre effort.
French postcard by Editions O.P., Paris, no. 109. Photo: Star.
French postcard by Editions E.C., Paris, no. 52. Photo: Ch. Delarue.
Diabolique
Paul Meurisse's most famous role was that of Michel Delasalle in the psychological thriller Les Diaboliques/Diabolique (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1955). Véra Clouzot and Simone Signoret play a woman and her husband's mistress who conspire to murder the man. After the crime is committed, however, his body disappears, and a number of strange occurrences ensue. In a thoroughly unsympathetic part, Meurisse was compelling as the husband and the film, with its dark, claustrophobic atmosphere and celebrated twist ending, became a success at the box office, with 3,674,380 admissions in France. It was also widely distributed in English-speaking markets and remains the film for which Meurisse is best known.
Other notable films in which Meurisse appeared include the mental hospital psychodrama La Tête contre les murs/Head Against the Wall (Georges Franju, 1959), the inquisitorial and oppressive Marie-Octobre/Secret Meeting (Julien Duvivier, 1959) starring Danielle Darrieux , Le Dejeuner sur l'herbe/Picnic on the Grass (Jean Renoir, 1959), and Clouzot's courtroom drama La Vérité/The Truth (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1960) with Brigitte Bardot .
James Travers at French Films.info : “In most of his films, he had the air of a French aristocrat, impeccably dressed and carried along by an unflappable insouciance - this is exemplified by his best known role, Commandant Théobald Dromard, a.k.a. Le Monocle”.
Meurisse played The Monocle in three Eurospy comedies: Le monocle noir/The Black Monocle (Georges Lautner, 1961), L'oeil du monocle/ The Eye of the Monocle (Georges Lautner, 1962) and Le monocle rit jaune/The Monocle's Sour Laugh (Georges Lautner, 1964).
An important director in his later career was Jean-Pierre Melville, for whom he appeared opposite Lino Ventura in the crime thriller Le deuxième soufflé/ Second Breath (Jean-Pierre Melville, 1966) and in the resistance drama L'Armée des ombres/Army of Shadows (Jean-Pierre Melville, 1969), again to critical acclaim.
Bruce Eder at AllMovie : “It's all a far cry from the heroics and bold statements of patriotism that one usually expects in movies on this subject, but the resulting tension results in an engrossing, often spellbinding cinematic experience across 140 minutes of screen time -- this reviewer (who never has the time for such indulgences) went back to see it three more times.”
In this period, Meurisse also played twice opposite Alain Delon : in the comedy Doucement les basses/Easy Down There! (Jacques Deray, 1971) and in the drama Le Gitan/The Gypsy (José Giovanni, 1975).
Additionally, Meurisse appeared in many stage productions, from Marcel Achard and Jean Anouilh to William Shakespeare and George Bernard Shaw. In the mid-1950s he was a sociétaire of the Comédie-Française.
Meurisse married three times, to actress Michèle Alfa (1942, divorced), Micheline Cheirel (1951, divorced) and Micheline Gary (1960 to his death). Paul Meurisse was taken ill following a performance of Mon père avait raison, a play by Sacha Guitry at the Théâtre Hébertot in Paris, and he died in 1979 in Neuilly-sur-Seine of an asthma-related heart attack. He was 66.
French postcard by Editions Chantal, Rueil, no. 58. Photo: Vog.
French postcard by La Roue Tourne, Paris.
Sources: James Travers (French Films.info), Bruce Eder (AllMovie), Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Wikipedia (English and Dutch), and .
French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 168. Photo: Star.
French postcard by Editions O.P., Paris, no. 192. Photo: Star.
Intense portrayal of a psychopathic hoodlum
Paul Gustave Pierre Meurisse was born in Dunkirk, on the north-east coast of France, in 1912. He grew up on the island of Corsica, to where his bank manager father had been transferred when Meurisse was a small child.
After leaving school he moved to Aix-en-Provence, where he became a solicitor's clerk. His passion was for the stage, and he obtained evening work in the chorus of music hall revues.
In 1936, he left Aix for Paris, with a letter of recommendation signed by Huguette Duflos . Meurisse found work at once, at the Trianon first, and then at the ABC music hall in a show by realistic singer Marie Dubas. He also appeared in Pigalle nightclubs. He specialised in taking cheerful, upbeat songs and singing them in a comically downbeat, lugubrious fashion.
In 1939, Meurisse met Edith Piaf, and the two became lovers for several months. Piaf however did not see a future for Meurisse as a singer, and encouraged him to try his hand at acting instead. They appeared together in the play Le Bel indifferent (1939), written for them by Jean Cocteau.
Meurisse's first screen role came in Vingt-quatre heures de perm’/Twenty-four hours permit (Maurice Cloche, 1945), filmed in 1940 but not released until 1945. The comedy Ne bougez plus/Do not move (Pierre Caron, 1941) was the first of his films to be released.
With Piaf he co-starred in the dramatic comedy Montmartre-sur-Seine (Georges Lacombe, 1941). Like most of Piaf's impulsive romances, Meurisse was soon discarded, but he managed to do quite well for himself.
His breakthrough was as a gangster opposite Françoise Rosay in Macadam/Back Streets of Paris (Marcel Blistène, 1946). James Travers reviews at Films de France : “Meurisse's intense portrayal of a psychopathic hoodlum is arguably the best thing about this film, particularly as it captures something of the sadism and uncontrolled inner rage that Edward G. Robinson brought to his early gangster portrayals. Here Meurisse is partnered with Simone Signoret , a stunning newcomer who had yet to make her film breakthrough but who steals every scene she appears in with her barely contained sensuality and charisma, the archetypal femme fatale.”
Thereafter his acting services were always in demand: in 1948 for example he was credited in no fewer than seven films. Meurisse played a wide range of roles, from gangsters in films like Impasse des Deux-Anges/Impasse of Two Angels (Maurice Tourneur, 1948) to policemen in Inspecteur Sergil/Inspector Sergil (Jacques Daroy, 1947) and Le Dessous des cartes/Under the Cards (André Cayatte, 1948), from comedy in the Monocle films to historical in La contessa di Castiglione/The Contessa's Secret (Georges Combret, 1954) and L'Affaire des poisons/The Poison Affair (Henri Decoin, 1955).
The quality of the films was variable, but Meurisse's versatility meant that his performance was often considered the best part of an otherwise mediocre effort.
French postcard by Editions O.P., Paris, no. 109. Photo: Star.
French postcard by Editions E.C., Paris, no. 52. Photo: Ch. Delarue.
Diabolique
Paul Meurisse's most famous role was that of Michel Delasalle in the psychological thriller Les Diaboliques/Diabolique (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1955). Véra Clouzot and Simone Signoret play a woman and her husband's mistress who conspire to murder the man. After the crime is committed, however, his body disappears, and a number of strange occurrences ensue. In a thoroughly unsympathetic part, Meurisse was compelling as the husband and the film, with its dark, claustrophobic atmosphere and celebrated twist ending, became a success at the box office, with 3,674,380 admissions in France. It was also widely distributed in English-speaking markets and remains the film for which Meurisse is best known.
Other notable films in which Meurisse appeared include the mental hospital psychodrama La Tête contre les murs/Head Against the Wall (Georges Franju, 1959), the inquisitorial and oppressive Marie-Octobre/Secret Meeting (Julien Duvivier, 1959) starring Danielle Darrieux , Le Dejeuner sur l'herbe/Picnic on the Grass (Jean Renoir, 1959), and Clouzot's courtroom drama La Vérité/The Truth (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1960) with Brigitte Bardot .
James Travers at French Films.info : “In most of his films, he had the air of a French aristocrat, impeccably dressed and carried along by an unflappable insouciance - this is exemplified by his best known role, Commandant Théobald Dromard, a.k.a. Le Monocle”.
Meurisse played The Monocle in three Eurospy comedies: Le monocle noir/The Black Monocle (Georges Lautner, 1961), L'oeil du monocle/ The Eye of the Monocle (Georges Lautner, 1962) and Le monocle rit jaune/The Monocle's Sour Laugh (Georges Lautner, 1964).
An important director in his later career was Jean-Pierre Melville, for whom he appeared opposite Lino Ventura in the crime thriller Le deuxième soufflé/ Second Breath (Jean-Pierre Melville, 1966) and in the resistance drama L'Armée des ombres/Army of Shadows (Jean-Pierre Melville, 1969), again to critical acclaim.
Bruce Eder at AllMovie : “It's all a far cry from the heroics and bold statements of patriotism that one usually expects in movies on this subject, but the resulting tension results in an engrossing, often spellbinding cinematic experience across 140 minutes of screen time -- this reviewer (who never has the time for such indulgences) went back to see it three more times.”
In this period, Meurisse also played twice opposite Alain Delon : in the comedy Doucement les basses/Easy Down There! (Jacques Deray, 1971) and in the drama Le Gitan/The Gypsy (José Giovanni, 1975).
Additionally, Meurisse appeared in many stage productions, from Marcel Achard and Jean Anouilh to William Shakespeare and George Bernard Shaw. In the mid-1950s he was a sociétaire of the Comédie-Française.
Meurisse married three times, to actress Michèle Alfa (1942, divorced), Micheline Cheirel (1951, divorced) and Micheline Gary (1960 to his death). Paul Meurisse was taken ill following a performance of Mon père avait raison, a play by Sacha Guitry at the Théâtre Hébertot in Paris, and he died in 1979 in Neuilly-sur-Seine of an asthma-related heart attack. He was 66.
French postcard by Editions Chantal, Rueil, no. 58. Photo: Vog.
French postcard by La Roue Tourne, Paris.
Sources: James Travers (French Films.info), Bruce Eder (AllMovie), Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Wikipedia (English and Dutch), and .
June 2, 2014
Noëlle Adam
Beautiful Noëlle Adam (1933) was a French ballet dancer and actress. She frequently co-starred with comic genius Louis De Funès, and later with her husband, Serge Reggiani.
French postcard by Editions du Globe, Paris, no. 732. Photo: Sam Lévin .
Beat Girl
Noëlle Adam was born Huguette Noëlle Adam in La Rochelle, France in 1933. She started out as a ballerina, and has been dancing since age 8.
In 1957, she made her film debut in the Louis de Funès comedy Comme un cheveu sur la soupe/Crazy in the Noodle (Maurice Régamey, 1957).
The following year, she played the female lead in another Louis de Funès farce, Ni vu, ni connu/Neither Seen Nor Recognized (Yves Robert, 1958).
In 1960, she married Sydney Chaplin. That year, she played a lead role in the British cult film Beat Girl (Edmond T. Gréville, 1960) opposite David Farrar and Christopher Lee.
In Italy she appeared with Donald O’Connor in the fantasy Le meraviglie di Aladino/The Wonders of Aladdin (Mario Bava, Henry Levin, 1961).
In 1962, Noëlle was cast as Jeannette, a photographer's assistant, in the musical No Strings. Richard Rodgers actually had the part largely rewritten once he had seen Noëlle. She had never sung before so he had her take singing lessons. While she was appearing in No Strings, her husband was at the same time appearing just down the street in Subways Are for Sleeping.
French postcard by St. Anne, Marseille. Photo: Sam Lévin .
Reggiani
In 1968, Noëlle Adam was back in France and played the mother of Josée ( Elisabeth Wiener ) in La prisonnière (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1968) with Laurent Terzieff .
She co-starred again with Louis de Funès in L’homme d’Orchestre/The One Man Band (Serge Korber, 1970).
She played a supporting part in L'imprécateur/The Accuser (Jean Louis Bertucelli, 1977).
For more than thirty years she was the companion of Serge Reggiani. With him, she appeared in Reggiani’s son Simon’s film De force avec d'autres/Forced to Be with Others (Simon Reggiani, 1993).
Her last film role was in the short mystery Plus fort que tout/Stronger than any (Hugues Deniset, 1999), in which she again co-starred with Serge Reggiani .
Reggiani and Adam eventually married in 2003, a year before his death.
Scene from L’homme d’Orchestre/The One Man Band (Serge Korber, 1970). Source: Succubian (YouTube).
Sources: Wikipedia (French), and .
French postcard by Editions du Globe, Paris, no. 732. Photo: Sam Lévin .
Beat Girl
Noëlle Adam was born Huguette Noëlle Adam in La Rochelle, France in 1933. She started out as a ballerina, and has been dancing since age 8.
In 1957, she made her film debut in the Louis de Funès comedy Comme un cheveu sur la soupe/Crazy in the Noodle (Maurice Régamey, 1957).
The following year, she played the female lead in another Louis de Funès farce, Ni vu, ni connu/Neither Seen Nor Recognized (Yves Robert, 1958).
In 1960, she married Sydney Chaplin. That year, she played a lead role in the British cult film Beat Girl (Edmond T. Gréville, 1960) opposite David Farrar and Christopher Lee.
In Italy she appeared with Donald O’Connor in the fantasy Le meraviglie di Aladino/The Wonders of Aladdin (Mario Bava, Henry Levin, 1961).
In 1962, Noëlle was cast as Jeannette, a photographer's assistant, in the musical No Strings. Richard Rodgers actually had the part largely rewritten once he had seen Noëlle. She had never sung before so he had her take singing lessons. While she was appearing in No Strings, her husband was at the same time appearing just down the street in Subways Are for Sleeping.
French postcard by St. Anne, Marseille. Photo: Sam Lévin .
Reggiani
In 1968, Noëlle Adam was back in France and played the mother of Josée ( Elisabeth Wiener ) in La prisonnière (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1968) with Laurent Terzieff .
She co-starred again with Louis de Funès in L’homme d’Orchestre/The One Man Band (Serge Korber, 1970).
She played a supporting part in L'imprécateur/The Accuser (Jean Louis Bertucelli, 1977).
For more than thirty years she was the companion of Serge Reggiani. With him, she appeared in Reggiani’s son Simon’s film De force avec d'autres/Forced to Be with Others (Simon Reggiani, 1993).
Her last film role was in the short mystery Plus fort que tout/Stronger than any (Hugues Deniset, 1999), in which she again co-starred with Serge Reggiani .
Reggiani and Adam eventually married in 2003, a year before his death.
Scene from L’homme d’Orchestre/The One Man Band (Serge Korber, 1970). Source: Succubian (YouTube).
Sources: Wikipedia (French), and .
June 1, 2014
Mistinguett
French actress and singer Mistinguett (1875-1956) captivated Paris with her risqué routines. She went on to become the most popular French entertainer of her time and the highest paid female entertainer in the world. She appeared more than 60 times in the cinema.
French postcard, sent by mail in 1905.
French postcard, no. 176. Collection: Didier Hanson.
Austrian postcard by Iris-Verlag, no. 5108. Photo: P. Apers.
Miss Tinguette
Mistinguett was born as Jeanne Florentine Bourgeois in Enghien-les-Bains, France, in 1875. She was the daughter of labourer Antoine Bourgeois, and seamstress Jeannette Debrée. At an early age Jeanne aspired to be an entertainer. She began as a flower seller in a restaurant in her home town, singing popular ballads as she sold her flowers.
When a song-writing acquaintance made up the name Miss Tinguette, Jeanne liked it. She made it her own by joining it together and eventually dropping the second S and the final E (Mistinguett). Mistinguett made her debut at the Casino de Paris in 1895, and appeared also in shows at the Folies Bergère, Moulin Rouge, and Eldorado.
In 1908 she made her film debut in the short silent film L'empreinte ou La main rouge/The Impression or the Red Hand (Henri Burguet, 1908) for Pathé Fréres. Her co-star in this film was Max Dearly, who chose her the next year to be his partner to create La valse chaloupée (or the Apache Dance) in the Moulin Rouge.
Between 1909 and 1915, she appeared on the stages of the Paris music halls but also in dozens of short films for Pathé, including Fleur de pavé/Her Dramatic Career (Albert Capellani, Michel Carré, 1909) with Charles Prince , Une petite femme bien douce/A Sweet Little Lady (George Denola, 1910) which she also wrote, and Le clown et le pacha/The Clown and the Pasha (Georges Monca, 1911), again with Prince.
In Une bougie récalcitrante/A Stubborn Spark Plug (Georges Monca, 1912), she appeared for the first time opposite the much younger Maurice Chevalier . With Chevalier she would have a relationship of more than 10 years.
The most successful film among her Pathé films was Les misérables (Albert Capelani, 1913), a four-part-serial based on the famous novel by Victor Hugo.
French postcard, no. 67. Photo: H. Manuel. Collection: Didier Hanson.
French postcard by Cinémagazine-Edition, Paris, no. 175. Photo: P. Apers.
French postcard by Bleuet, no. 970. Photo Utudjian, Paris.
French postcard. Illustration: Cabrol. Collection: Marlène Pilaete.
Legs of 500,000 Francs
During the First World War Mistinguett continued to appear in Pathé productions like the comedies La valse renversante/The Amazing Waltz (Georges Monca, 1914) again opposite Maurice Chevalier , and Rigadin et la jolie manucure/Rigadin and the Pretty Manicurist (Georges Monca, 1915) with Charles Prince .
In Italy she appeared in La doppia ferita/The Double Injury (Augusto Genina, 1915). Opposite the legendary Harry Baur she starred in Chignon d'or/The Gold Chignon (André Hugon, 1916) and Fleur de Paris/Flower of Paris (André Hugon, 1916).
In 1916 she first recorded her signature song Mon Homme. It was popularised under its English title My Man by Fanny Brice and has become a standard in the repertoire of numerous pop and jazz singers.
In 1918, she succeeded Gaby Deslys at the Casino de Paris, and remained the undisputed star of nocturnal Paris until 1925. In 1919 her legs were insured for the then astounding amount of 500,000 francs. During a tour of the United States, she was asked by Time magazine to explain her popularity. Her answer was: "It is a kind of magnetism. I say 'Come closer' and draw them to me."
After WWI Mistinguett's film career halted. She only appeared in a few more films, including L'île d'amour/Island of Love (Berthe Dagmar, Jean Durand, 1928) and Rigolboche (Christian-Jaque, 1936). Mistinguett's stage career prospered and lasted over fifty years.
Her last film appearance was as herself in the Italian musical Carosello del varietà/Variety Carousel (Aldo Bonaldi, Aldo Quinti, 1955). In 1956, Mistinguett died at the age of 80. She is buried in the Cimetiere Enghien-les-Bains, Île-de-France, France.
French postcard, no. 113. Photo: Studio Harcourt.
French postcard by Editions P.I., no. 49. Photo: Studio Piaz.
French or Belgian postcard. Mistinguett in the sound film Rigolboche (Christian-Jaque, 1936).
Sources: Wikipedia and .
French postcard, sent by mail in 1905.
French postcard, no. 176. Collection: Didier Hanson.
Austrian postcard by Iris-Verlag, no. 5108. Photo: P. Apers.
Miss Tinguette
Mistinguett was born as Jeanne Florentine Bourgeois in Enghien-les-Bains, France, in 1875. She was the daughter of labourer Antoine Bourgeois, and seamstress Jeannette Debrée. At an early age Jeanne aspired to be an entertainer. She began as a flower seller in a restaurant in her home town, singing popular ballads as she sold her flowers.
When a song-writing acquaintance made up the name Miss Tinguette, Jeanne liked it. She made it her own by joining it together and eventually dropping the second S and the final E (Mistinguett). Mistinguett made her debut at the Casino de Paris in 1895, and appeared also in shows at the Folies Bergère, Moulin Rouge, and Eldorado.
In 1908 she made her film debut in the short silent film L'empreinte ou La main rouge/The Impression or the Red Hand (Henri Burguet, 1908) for Pathé Fréres. Her co-star in this film was Max Dearly, who chose her the next year to be his partner to create La valse chaloupée (or the Apache Dance) in the Moulin Rouge.
Between 1909 and 1915, she appeared on the stages of the Paris music halls but also in dozens of short films for Pathé, including Fleur de pavé/Her Dramatic Career (Albert Capellani, Michel Carré, 1909) with Charles Prince , Une petite femme bien douce/A Sweet Little Lady (George Denola, 1910) which she also wrote, and Le clown et le pacha/The Clown and the Pasha (Georges Monca, 1911), again with Prince.
In Une bougie récalcitrante/A Stubborn Spark Plug (Georges Monca, 1912), she appeared for the first time opposite the much younger Maurice Chevalier . With Chevalier she would have a relationship of more than 10 years.
The most successful film among her Pathé films was Les misérables (Albert Capelani, 1913), a four-part-serial based on the famous novel by Victor Hugo.
French postcard, no. 67. Photo: H. Manuel. Collection: Didier Hanson.
French postcard by Cinémagazine-Edition, Paris, no. 175. Photo: P. Apers.
French postcard by Bleuet, no. 970. Photo Utudjian, Paris.
French postcard. Illustration: Cabrol. Collection: Marlène Pilaete.
Legs of 500,000 Francs
During the First World War Mistinguett continued to appear in Pathé productions like the comedies La valse renversante/The Amazing Waltz (Georges Monca, 1914) again opposite Maurice Chevalier , and Rigadin et la jolie manucure/Rigadin and the Pretty Manicurist (Georges Monca, 1915) with Charles Prince .
In Italy she appeared in La doppia ferita/The Double Injury (Augusto Genina, 1915). Opposite the legendary Harry Baur she starred in Chignon d'or/The Gold Chignon (André Hugon, 1916) and Fleur de Paris/Flower of Paris (André Hugon, 1916).
In 1916 she first recorded her signature song Mon Homme. It was popularised under its English title My Man by Fanny Brice and has become a standard in the repertoire of numerous pop and jazz singers.
In 1918, she succeeded Gaby Deslys at the Casino de Paris, and remained the undisputed star of nocturnal Paris until 1925. In 1919 her legs were insured for the then astounding amount of 500,000 francs. During a tour of the United States, she was asked by Time magazine to explain her popularity. Her answer was: "It is a kind of magnetism. I say 'Come closer' and draw them to me."
After WWI Mistinguett's film career halted. She only appeared in a few more films, including L'île d'amour/Island of Love (Berthe Dagmar, Jean Durand, 1928) and Rigolboche (Christian-Jaque, 1936). Mistinguett's stage career prospered and lasted over fifty years.
Her last film appearance was as herself in the Italian musical Carosello del varietà/Variety Carousel (Aldo Bonaldi, Aldo Quinti, 1955). In 1956, Mistinguett died at the age of 80. She is buried in the Cimetiere Enghien-les-Bains, Île-de-France, France.
French postcard, no. 113. Photo: Studio Harcourt.
French postcard by Editions P.I., no. 49. Photo: Studio Piaz.
French or Belgian postcard. Mistinguett in the sound film Rigolboche (Christian-Jaque, 1936).
Sources: Wikipedia and .
May 31, 2014
Peter van Eyck
German-American actor Peter van Eyck (1911-1969) was best known for the classic French thriller Le Salaire de la Peur/The Wages of Fear (1953). With his whitish blond crew-cut, Van Eyck was destined to be typecast in international war films as the arrogant Nazi.
East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 1057, 1959. Retail price: 0,20 DM. Photo: Roxi-Film.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H, Minden / Westf., no. 755. Photo: Europa / Gabriele du Vinage.
A German Truck Driver in Hollywood
Peter van Eyck was born Götz von Eick in Steinwehr, Germany (now Kamienny Jaz, Poland) in 1911. He was the son of an aristocratic Prussian land owner. His father intended him to embark on a military career, but Peter spent his education in Berlin, where he studied music.
In 1931 he left Germany, living in Paris, London, Tunis, Algiers and Cuba, before settling in New York. There he became acquainted with the composer Aaron Copland, which led to a collaboration, as well as solo efforts, as composer and lyricist on a variety of songs for revue and cabaret. He also moonlighted as a pianist in bars and nightclubs.
Around this time, he also began to work as a stage manager and arranger for Irving Berlin. He then worked for a while with Orson Welles at the Mercury Theatre company as an assistant director.
As a truck driver Van Eyck went to Hollywood. There, he initially found radio work with the help of Billy Wilder, who he knew from Berlin. Wilder also helped him making his film debut in The Moon is Low (Irving Pichel, 1943), a downbeat drama about German troops invading Norway during WWII, based on a novel by John Steinbeck.
Wilder also gave Van Eyck a small role as a German soldier in the World War II drama Five Graves to Cairo (Billy Wilder, 1943), starring Franchot Tone. Van Eyck had a bigger part, again as a Nazi, in the propaganda film Address Unknown (William Cameron Menzies, 1944) about two families caught up in the rise of Nazism in Germany prior to the start of World War II.
He also played in the American propaganda drama The Impostor (Julien Duvivier, 1944) starring Jean Gabin . In 1943 Van Eyck took US citizenship and was drafted into the army as a commissioned officer.
At the end of the war he returned to Germany as film officer for the 'Office of Military Government, United States' (OMGUS) and remained there until 1948 as director of the film section.
In 1949 he appeared in his first German film Hallo, Fräulein!/Hello Fraulein (Rudolf Jugert, 1949), ironically cast as an American. He also appeared as an American in the comedy Königskinder/Royal Children (Helmut Käutner, 1950), with Jenny Jugo .
East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 1535, 1961. Retail price: 0,20 DM. Photo: publicity still for Dr. Crippen lebt/Doctor Crippen lives (Erich Engels, 1958) with Elisabeth Müller .
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H, Minden / Westf., no. 2920. Photo: Bavaria / Schorcht / Vogelmann. Publicity still for Der Gläserne Turm/The Glass Tower (Harald Braun, 1957).
German postcard by Rüdel-Verlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 2852. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Alfa / Prisma. Publicity still for Geheimaktion Schwarze Kapelle/The Black Chapel (Ralph Habib, 1959) with Dawn Addams .
Typecast as a Nazi or another Unsympathetic Type
Peter van Eyck gained international recognition with a leading role in the French-Italian thriller Le Salaire de la peur/The Wages of Fear (1953) directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot. When a South American oil well owned by an American company catches fire, the company hires four European daredevils ( Yves Montand , Charles Vanel , Folco Lulli and Van Eyck as the Dutchman Bimba) as truck drivers to traverse an impenetrable South American jungle with a deadly load of nitro-glycerine.
In English-language films he was most often typecast as a Nazi or another unsympathetic type, such as in The Desert Fox (Henry Hathaway, 1951) a biographical film about Field Marshal Erwin Rommel ( James Mason ) in the later stages of World War II. This was ironic, because Van Eyck was an avowed anti-fascist.
Other examples of this typecasting are the British war film Single-Handed/Sailor of the King (Roy Boulting, 1953) starring Jeffrey Hunter and Michael Rennie, and the American war film Attack! (Robert Aldrich, 1956) starring Jack Palance and Lee Marvin.
Van Eyck went to appear in episodes of several US TV series including The Adventures of Ellery Queen (1955) and Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1956).
In France he appeared opposite Gina Lollobrigida and Jean-Claude Pascal in the drama Le Grand Jeu/Flesh and the Woman (Robert Siodmak, 1954) which was entered into the 1954 Cannes Film Festival.
He worked with Orson Welles again at the French-Spanish-Swiss co-production Mr. Arkadin/Confidential Report (Orson Welles, 1955). Like many of Welles's other films, Mr. Arkadin was heavily edited without his input.
Another French production was the crime drama Retour de manivelle/There's Always a Price Tag (Denys de La Patellière, 1957), based on novel by James Hadley Chase. The film stars Michèle Morgan and Daniel Gélin .
He also played the womanizing Frenchman Fribert in Das Mädchen Rosemarie/The Girl Rosemarie (Rolf Thiele, 1958) featuring Nadja Tiller , and a police inspector investigating a famous murder in Dr. Crippen lebt/Dr.Crippen lives (Erich Engels, 1958), with Elisabeth Müller . Also interesting was the crime drama Verbrechen nach Schulschluß/The Young Go Wild (Alfred Vohrer, 1959) with Christian Wolff .
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 4779. Retail price: 25 Pfg. Photo: Grimm / Ufa.
British postcard in the Picture Show Postcard Series.
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 4815. Photo: Ringpress / Vogelmann / Ufa.
Doctor Mabuse
In Germany Peter van Eyck was a popular leading man in a wide range of films. In 1959 he appeared opposite Hardy Krüger in the West German crime film Der Rest ist Schweigen/The Rest Is Silence (Helmut Käutner, 1959), which was entered into the 9th Berlin International Film Festival.
He starred in three Doctor Mabuse thrillers, starting with Die 1000 Augen des Dr. Mabuse/Diabolical Dr. Mabuse (Fritz Lang, 1960) with Wolfgang Preiss as Dr. Mabuse.
He also starred as an overly dedicated scientist in the Anglo-German production Ein Toter sucht seinen Mörder/The Brain (Freddie Francis, 1962) the third film version of the Curt Siodmak scare piece Donovan's Brain. When a powerful and ruthless financier dies in a plane crash, Van Eyck keeps the tycoon's brain alive in his laboratory. The brain compels Van Eyck to seek out the financier's murderer.
Van Eyck continued to appear in international war films, including the British production Foxhole in Cairo (John Llewellyn Moxey, 1960) based upon the real-life Operation Salaam. He also was among the ensemble cast of The Longest Day (Darryl F. Zanuck, Bernhard Wicki , a.o., 1962), about D-Day, the Normandy landings on 6 June 1944, during World War II.
He had a supporting part as the East German intelligence officer Mundt in the British Cold War spy film The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (Martin Ritt, 1965), starring Richard Burton and based on the novel by John le Carré.
He also appeared in the British Western Shalako (Edward Dmytryk, 1968), starring Sean Connery and Brigitte Bardot, which was filmed in Spain.
His final film was the war film The Bridge at Remagen (John Guillermin, 1969), a highly-fictionalized version of actual events during the last months of World War II when the U.S. 9th Armored Division approached Remagen and found the Ludendorff Bridge still intact. The bridge, named for General Erich Ludendorff, is never actually mentioned by name in the film, which re-enacts the week-long battle and several artillery duels that the Americans fought before gaining a bridgehead across the Rhine for their final push into Germany.
Van Eyck was married to the American actress Ruth Ford from 1940 till 1945. With his second wife, Inge von Voris, he had two daughters, actress Kristina van Eyck, and Claudia van Eyck. At the age of 57, Peter van Eyck died of sepsis in 1969 in Männedorf near Zürich, Switzerland, after he had left a relatively small injury untreated.
Trailer Le Salaire de la peur/The Wages of Fear (1953). Source: Fransefilms (YouTube).
Trailer Dr. Crippen lebt/Dr.Crippen lives (1958). Source: Arild Rafalzik (YouTube).
Trailer Die 1000 Augen des Dr. Mabuse/Diabolical Dr. Mabuse (1960). Source: Sleaze-o-Rama (YouTube).
Sources: (IMDb), Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Prisma.de (German), Wikipedia, and .
East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 1057, 1959. Retail price: 0,20 DM. Photo: Roxi-Film.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H, Minden / Westf., no. 755. Photo: Europa / Gabriele du Vinage.
A German Truck Driver in Hollywood
Peter van Eyck was born Götz von Eick in Steinwehr, Germany (now Kamienny Jaz, Poland) in 1911. He was the son of an aristocratic Prussian land owner. His father intended him to embark on a military career, but Peter spent his education in Berlin, where he studied music.
In 1931 he left Germany, living in Paris, London, Tunis, Algiers and Cuba, before settling in New York. There he became acquainted with the composer Aaron Copland, which led to a collaboration, as well as solo efforts, as composer and lyricist on a variety of songs for revue and cabaret. He also moonlighted as a pianist in bars and nightclubs.
Around this time, he also began to work as a stage manager and arranger for Irving Berlin. He then worked for a while with Orson Welles at the Mercury Theatre company as an assistant director.
As a truck driver Van Eyck went to Hollywood. There, he initially found radio work with the help of Billy Wilder, who he knew from Berlin. Wilder also helped him making his film debut in The Moon is Low (Irving Pichel, 1943), a downbeat drama about German troops invading Norway during WWII, based on a novel by John Steinbeck.
Wilder also gave Van Eyck a small role as a German soldier in the World War II drama Five Graves to Cairo (Billy Wilder, 1943), starring Franchot Tone. Van Eyck had a bigger part, again as a Nazi, in the propaganda film Address Unknown (William Cameron Menzies, 1944) about two families caught up in the rise of Nazism in Germany prior to the start of World War II.
He also played in the American propaganda drama The Impostor (Julien Duvivier, 1944) starring Jean Gabin . In 1943 Van Eyck took US citizenship and was drafted into the army as a commissioned officer.
At the end of the war he returned to Germany as film officer for the 'Office of Military Government, United States' (OMGUS) and remained there until 1948 as director of the film section.
In 1949 he appeared in his first German film Hallo, Fräulein!/Hello Fraulein (Rudolf Jugert, 1949), ironically cast as an American. He also appeared as an American in the comedy Königskinder/Royal Children (Helmut Käutner, 1950), with Jenny Jugo .
East-German postcard by VEB Progress Film-Vertrieb, Berlin, no. 1535, 1961. Retail price: 0,20 DM. Photo: publicity still for Dr. Crippen lebt/Doctor Crippen lives (Erich Engels, 1958) with Elisabeth Müller .
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H, Minden / Westf., no. 2920. Photo: Bavaria / Schorcht / Vogelmann. Publicity still for Der Gläserne Turm/The Glass Tower (Harald Braun, 1957).
German postcard by Rüdel-Verlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 2852. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Alfa / Prisma. Publicity still for Geheimaktion Schwarze Kapelle/The Black Chapel (Ralph Habib, 1959) with Dawn Addams .
Typecast as a Nazi or another Unsympathetic Type
Peter van Eyck gained international recognition with a leading role in the French-Italian thriller Le Salaire de la peur/The Wages of Fear (1953) directed by Henri-Georges Clouzot. When a South American oil well owned by an American company catches fire, the company hires four European daredevils ( Yves Montand , Charles Vanel , Folco Lulli and Van Eyck as the Dutchman Bimba) as truck drivers to traverse an impenetrable South American jungle with a deadly load of nitro-glycerine.
In English-language films he was most often typecast as a Nazi or another unsympathetic type, such as in The Desert Fox (Henry Hathaway, 1951) a biographical film about Field Marshal Erwin Rommel ( James Mason ) in the later stages of World War II. This was ironic, because Van Eyck was an avowed anti-fascist.
Other examples of this typecasting are the British war film Single-Handed/Sailor of the King (Roy Boulting, 1953) starring Jeffrey Hunter and Michael Rennie, and the American war film Attack! (Robert Aldrich, 1956) starring Jack Palance and Lee Marvin.
Van Eyck went to appear in episodes of several US TV series including The Adventures of Ellery Queen (1955) and Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1956).
In France he appeared opposite Gina Lollobrigida and Jean-Claude Pascal in the drama Le Grand Jeu/Flesh and the Woman (Robert Siodmak, 1954) which was entered into the 1954 Cannes Film Festival.
He worked with Orson Welles again at the French-Spanish-Swiss co-production Mr. Arkadin/Confidential Report (Orson Welles, 1955). Like many of Welles's other films, Mr. Arkadin was heavily edited without his input.
Another French production was the crime drama Retour de manivelle/There's Always a Price Tag (Denys de La Patellière, 1957), based on novel by James Hadley Chase. The film stars Michèle Morgan and Daniel Gélin .
He also played the womanizing Frenchman Fribert in Das Mädchen Rosemarie/The Girl Rosemarie (Rolf Thiele, 1958) featuring Nadja Tiller , and a police inspector investigating a famous murder in Dr. Crippen lebt/Dr.Crippen lives (Erich Engels, 1958), with Elisabeth Müller . Also interesting was the crime drama Verbrechen nach Schulschluß/The Young Go Wild (Alfred Vohrer, 1959) with Christian Wolff .
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 4779. Retail price: 25 Pfg. Photo: Grimm / Ufa.
British postcard in the Picture Show Postcard Series.
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 4815. Photo: Ringpress / Vogelmann / Ufa.
Doctor Mabuse
In Germany Peter van Eyck was a popular leading man in a wide range of films. In 1959 he appeared opposite Hardy Krüger in the West German crime film Der Rest ist Schweigen/The Rest Is Silence (Helmut Käutner, 1959), which was entered into the 9th Berlin International Film Festival.
He starred in three Doctor Mabuse thrillers, starting with Die 1000 Augen des Dr. Mabuse/Diabolical Dr. Mabuse (Fritz Lang, 1960) with Wolfgang Preiss as Dr. Mabuse.
He also starred as an overly dedicated scientist in the Anglo-German production Ein Toter sucht seinen Mörder/The Brain (Freddie Francis, 1962) the third film version of the Curt Siodmak scare piece Donovan's Brain. When a powerful and ruthless financier dies in a plane crash, Van Eyck keeps the tycoon's brain alive in his laboratory. The brain compels Van Eyck to seek out the financier's murderer.
Van Eyck continued to appear in international war films, including the British production Foxhole in Cairo (John Llewellyn Moxey, 1960) based upon the real-life Operation Salaam. He also was among the ensemble cast of The Longest Day (Darryl F. Zanuck, Bernhard Wicki , a.o., 1962), about D-Day, the Normandy landings on 6 June 1944, during World War II.
He had a supporting part as the East German intelligence officer Mundt in the British Cold War spy film The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (Martin Ritt, 1965), starring Richard Burton and based on the novel by John le Carré.
He also appeared in the British Western Shalako (Edward Dmytryk, 1968), starring Sean Connery and Brigitte Bardot, which was filmed in Spain.
His final film was the war film The Bridge at Remagen (John Guillermin, 1969), a highly-fictionalized version of actual events during the last months of World War II when the U.S. 9th Armored Division approached Remagen and found the Ludendorff Bridge still intact. The bridge, named for General Erich Ludendorff, is never actually mentioned by name in the film, which re-enacts the week-long battle and several artillery duels that the Americans fought before gaining a bridgehead across the Rhine for their final push into Germany.
Van Eyck was married to the American actress Ruth Ford from 1940 till 1945. With his second wife, Inge von Voris, he had two daughters, actress Kristina van Eyck, and Claudia van Eyck. At the age of 57, Peter van Eyck died of sepsis in 1969 in Männedorf near Zürich, Switzerland, after he had left a relatively small injury untreated.
Trailer Le Salaire de la peur/The Wages of Fear (1953). Source: Fransefilms (YouTube).
Trailer Dr. Crippen lebt/Dr.Crippen lives (1958). Source: Arild Rafalzik (YouTube).
Trailer Die 1000 Augen des Dr. Mabuse/Diabolical Dr. Mabuse (1960). Source: Sleaze-o-Rama (YouTube).
Sources: (IMDb), Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Prisma.de (German), Wikipedia, and .
May 30, 2014
Karlheinz Böhm (1928-2014)
Last Thursday, 29 May 2014, Austrian actor Karlheinz Böhm has passed away after a long illness. Böhm, who was sometimes referred to as Carl Boehm or Karl Boehm, played in 45 films. He was the young Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria in the Sissi trilogy. He and Romy Schneider became the perfect couple of the German cinema of the 1950s. Internationally, he is also known for his role as Mark, the psychopathic protagonist of Michael Powell's terrifying thriller Peeping Tom (1960).
Dutch postcard by Kolibri, Wormerveer, no. 2168. Photo: Rhombus / Herzog-Film / Czerwonski.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H., Minden (Westf.), no. F 15. Retail price: 25 Pf. Photo: Herzog-Film.
Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam; licency holder of Ufa, Berlin; no. 1004. Photo: Ufa.
German postcard by Universum-Film Aktiengesellschaft, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. CK-28. Retail price: 30 Pfg. Photo: Arthur Grimm / UFA.
Elegant Young Lover
Karlheinz Böhm (sometimes Carl Boehm) was born in Darmstadt, Germany in 1928. His father was the conductor Karl Böhm and his mother the soprano Thea Linhart.
Karlheinz started his career in 1948 as an assistant director of Der Engel mit der Posaune/The Angel with the Trumpet (Karl Hartl, 1948), in which he also played a small part.
Later he attended the actor's training at the Burgtheater and subsequently became a member of the ensemble.
In 1952, Karl Hartl brought him to Munich for Haus des Lebens/House of Life (Karl Hartl, 1952) starring Gustav Fröhlich .
In the following decade, Böhm appeared in more than 30 films. His first success was his role as the elegant young lover of Alraune/Mandrake (Arthur Maria Rabenalt, 1952) starring Hildegard Knef .
Then he often appeared as a sincere and respectable young man in films like Salto Mortale (1953, Victor Tourjansky) with Margot Hielscher , and Ich war ein häßliches Mädchen/I Was an Ugly Girl (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1955) featuring beautiful Sonja Ziemann .
Dutch Postcard, no. F 213.
Dutch postcard by Takken, Utrecht, no. 2064.
Dutch postcard by Uitg. Takken, Utrecht, no. 3720. Photo: ERMA-Herzog-film-Wien. Publicity still for Sissi - Schicksalsjahre einer Kaiserin/Sissi: The Fateful Years of an Empress (Ernst Marischka, 1957).
A Serious Image Problem
Hugely popular were the three Sissi films. Karlheinz Böhm and Romy Schneider formed the perfect couple of the German film in the 1950s.
During the shooting of the first episode, Sissi (Ernst Marischka, 1955), the then 16-year-old Schneider used to call him 'Uncle Karlheinz', although he was just 12 years her senior.
The sequels were Sissi - Die junge Kaiserin/Sissi: The Young Empress (Ernst Marischka, 1956) and Sissi - Schicksalsjahre einer Kaiserin/Sissi: The Fateful Years of an Empress (Ernst Marischka, 1957).
More stiff juvenile hero parts followed in films like Das Schloß in Tirol/Castle in Tyrol (Géza von Radványi, 1957) opposite Erika Remberg , and Das Dreimäderlhaus/The House of the Three Girls (Ernst Marischka, 1958) with Johanna Matz .
They left Böhm with a serious image problem. He attempted a change in international films, but with his first British film he succeeded almost too well.
Dutch postcard by N.V. Int. Filmpers (I.F.P.), Amsterdam, no. 1027.
Dutch postcard printed by Takken, Utrecht, no. AX 1980. Photo by Filmex N.V.
Dutch publicity photo by Filmex. Still for Sissi - Die junge Kaiserin (1956) with Vilma Degischer.
Voyeur
Outside of Europe, Karlheinz Böhm is probably best known for his role as the psychopathic voyeur and serial killer Mark in Peeping Tom (Michael Powell, 1960).
The film received slating reviews by British and German critics, but it was re-examined 20 years later and is nowadays considered as a masterpiece.
Böhm subsequently appeared with Jayne Mansfield in the striptease thriller Too Hot to Handle (Terence Young, 1959) and the French thriller La Croix des vivants/Cross of the Living (Ivan Govar, 1960) with Pascale Petit .
Next he appeared as the Nazi-sympathizing son of Lee J. Cobb in the remake of The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (Vincente Minnelli, 1963).
In Hollywood, he also played Jakob Grimm in the Cinerama spectacular The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm (Henry Levin, 1963), Ludwig van Beethoven in the Disney production The Magnificent Rebel (Georg Tressler, 1962) and a sadistic agent in The Venetian Affair (Jerry Thorpe) with Robert Vaughn.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag, no. 2773.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag, no. 665. Photo: Helios / Schorchtfilm. Still for Haus des Lebens/House of Life (Karl Hartl, 1952).
German postcard by F.J. Rüdel, Filmpostkartenverlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 628. Photo: Rotary / Deutsche London / Hämmerer. Publicity still for Arlette erobert Paris/ Arlette Conquers Paris (Viktor Tourjansky, 1953).
German postcard by F.J. Rüdel, Filmpostkartenverlag (Rüdel-Verlag), Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 1294. Photo: Berolina / Constantin / Wesel. Publicity still for Die heilige Lüge/Sacred Lie (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1954).
Dutch postcard by Uitg. Takken, Utrecht, no. 1961. Photo: Filmex-Herzog. Still for Kitty und die Grosse Welt (Alfred Weidenmann, 1956).
Ethiopia
In the mid-1960s Karlheinz Böhm moved to Italy and focussed more on his theatre work. In 1964, he made his debut as a director of opera productions.
A second German film career began in 1972, when Rainer Werner Fassbinder made full use of Böhm's by now many-layered star image.
He first cast him as the worldly-wise Prussian councillor Wüllersdorf in Fontane - Effi Briest/Effi Briest (1974) opposite Hanna Schygulla, and then as the sadistic husband of Margit Carstensen in the TV thriller Martha (1974).
Böhm played a homosexual art dealer in Fassbinder's Faustrecht der Freiheit/Fox and His Friends (1975), and finally the arrogant, middle-class communist Tillmann in Mutter Küsters Fahrt zum Himmel/Mother Küsters Goes to Heaven (1975) featuring Brigitte Mira.
Later, Böhm was mainly appearing on stage or in TV productions. After losing a bet on the popular German TV show Wetten, dass..? (You Bet That..?) (1981), he founded the charity organization Menschen für Menschen (People For People). For over 30 years, Karlheinz Böhm promoted charities for starving children in Central Africa and Ethiopia.
He was the father of Sissi Böhm (born in 1955) from his first wife Elisabeth Zonewa; Kristina (1959), Michael (1960) and Daniela (1961) from his second wife actress Gudula Blau, and actress Katharina Böhm (1964) from his third wife Barbara Lass.
His fourth wife, Almaz Böhm, a native from Ethiopia, gave birth to their children Nicolas (1990) and Aida (1993). Actor Florian Böhm (1978) is his grandson.
Karlheinz Böhm died in Grödig, Salzburg, Austria. He was 86.
German postcard by WS-Druck, no. F 139. Retail price: 30 Pfg. (Edges cut off).
German postcard by UFA, no. CK-126. Retail price: 30 Pfg. Photo: UFA. Collection: Egbert Barten.
Trailer for Sissi (1955). Source: Kinoweltdvd (YouTube).
Sources: Encyclopedia of European Cinema, Filmportal.de, Wikipedia and
Dutch postcard by Kolibri, Wormerveer, no. 2168. Photo: Rhombus / Herzog-Film / Czerwonski.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H., Minden (Westf.), no. F 15. Retail price: 25 Pf. Photo: Herzog-Film.
Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam; licency holder of Ufa, Berlin; no. 1004. Photo: Ufa.
German postcard by Universum-Film Aktiengesellschaft, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. CK-28. Retail price: 30 Pfg. Photo: Arthur Grimm / UFA.
Elegant Young Lover
Karlheinz Böhm (sometimes Carl Boehm) was born in Darmstadt, Germany in 1928. His father was the conductor Karl Böhm and his mother the soprano Thea Linhart.
Karlheinz started his career in 1948 as an assistant director of Der Engel mit der Posaune/The Angel with the Trumpet (Karl Hartl, 1948), in which he also played a small part.
Later he attended the actor's training at the Burgtheater and subsequently became a member of the ensemble.
In 1952, Karl Hartl brought him to Munich for Haus des Lebens/House of Life (Karl Hartl, 1952) starring Gustav Fröhlich .
In the following decade, Böhm appeared in more than 30 films. His first success was his role as the elegant young lover of Alraune/Mandrake (Arthur Maria Rabenalt, 1952) starring Hildegard Knef .
Then he often appeared as a sincere and respectable young man in films like Salto Mortale (1953, Victor Tourjansky) with Margot Hielscher , and Ich war ein häßliches Mädchen/I Was an Ugly Girl (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1955) featuring beautiful Sonja Ziemann .
Dutch Postcard, no. F 213.
Dutch postcard by Takken, Utrecht, no. 2064.
Dutch postcard by Uitg. Takken, Utrecht, no. 3720. Photo: ERMA-Herzog-film-Wien. Publicity still for Sissi - Schicksalsjahre einer Kaiserin/Sissi: The Fateful Years of an Empress (Ernst Marischka, 1957).
A Serious Image Problem
Hugely popular were the three Sissi films. Karlheinz Böhm and Romy Schneider formed the perfect couple of the German film in the 1950s.
During the shooting of the first episode, Sissi (Ernst Marischka, 1955), the then 16-year-old Schneider used to call him 'Uncle Karlheinz', although he was just 12 years her senior.
The sequels were Sissi - Die junge Kaiserin/Sissi: The Young Empress (Ernst Marischka, 1956) and Sissi - Schicksalsjahre einer Kaiserin/Sissi: The Fateful Years of an Empress (Ernst Marischka, 1957).
More stiff juvenile hero parts followed in films like Das Schloß in Tirol/Castle in Tyrol (Géza von Radványi, 1957) opposite Erika Remberg , and Das Dreimäderlhaus/The House of the Three Girls (Ernst Marischka, 1958) with Johanna Matz .
They left Böhm with a serious image problem. He attempted a change in international films, but with his first British film he succeeded almost too well.
Dutch postcard by N.V. Int. Filmpers (I.F.P.), Amsterdam, no. 1027.
Dutch postcard printed by Takken, Utrecht, no. AX 1980. Photo by Filmex N.V.
Dutch publicity photo by Filmex. Still for Sissi - Die junge Kaiserin (1956) with Vilma Degischer.
Voyeur
Outside of Europe, Karlheinz Böhm is probably best known for his role as the psychopathic voyeur and serial killer Mark in Peeping Tom (Michael Powell, 1960).
The film received slating reviews by British and German critics, but it was re-examined 20 years later and is nowadays considered as a masterpiece.
Böhm subsequently appeared with Jayne Mansfield in the striptease thriller Too Hot to Handle (Terence Young, 1959) and the French thriller La Croix des vivants/Cross of the Living (Ivan Govar, 1960) with Pascale Petit .
Next he appeared as the Nazi-sympathizing son of Lee J. Cobb in the remake of The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (Vincente Minnelli, 1963).
In Hollywood, he also played Jakob Grimm in the Cinerama spectacular The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm (Henry Levin, 1963), Ludwig van Beethoven in the Disney production The Magnificent Rebel (Georg Tressler, 1962) and a sadistic agent in The Venetian Affair (Jerry Thorpe) with Robert Vaughn.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag, no. 2773.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag, no. 665. Photo: Helios / Schorchtfilm. Still for Haus des Lebens/House of Life (Karl Hartl, 1952).
German postcard by F.J. Rüdel, Filmpostkartenverlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 628. Photo: Rotary / Deutsche London / Hämmerer. Publicity still for Arlette erobert Paris/ Arlette Conquers Paris (Viktor Tourjansky, 1953).
German postcard by F.J. Rüdel, Filmpostkartenverlag (Rüdel-Verlag), Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 1294. Photo: Berolina / Constantin / Wesel. Publicity still for Die heilige Lüge/Sacred Lie (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1954).
Dutch postcard by Uitg. Takken, Utrecht, no. 1961. Photo: Filmex-Herzog. Still for Kitty und die Grosse Welt (Alfred Weidenmann, 1956).
Ethiopia
In the mid-1960s Karlheinz Böhm moved to Italy and focussed more on his theatre work. In 1964, he made his debut as a director of opera productions.
A second German film career began in 1972, when Rainer Werner Fassbinder made full use of Böhm's by now many-layered star image.
He first cast him as the worldly-wise Prussian councillor Wüllersdorf in Fontane - Effi Briest/Effi Briest (1974) opposite Hanna Schygulla, and then as the sadistic husband of Margit Carstensen in the TV thriller Martha (1974).
Böhm played a homosexual art dealer in Fassbinder's Faustrecht der Freiheit/Fox and His Friends (1975), and finally the arrogant, middle-class communist Tillmann in Mutter Küsters Fahrt zum Himmel/Mother Küsters Goes to Heaven (1975) featuring Brigitte Mira.
Later, Böhm was mainly appearing on stage or in TV productions. After losing a bet on the popular German TV show Wetten, dass..? (You Bet That..?) (1981), he founded the charity organization Menschen für Menschen (People For People). For over 30 years, Karlheinz Böhm promoted charities for starving children in Central Africa and Ethiopia.
He was the father of Sissi Böhm (born in 1955) from his first wife Elisabeth Zonewa; Kristina (1959), Michael (1960) and Daniela (1961) from his second wife actress Gudula Blau, and actress Katharina Böhm (1964) from his third wife Barbara Lass.
His fourth wife, Almaz Böhm, a native from Ethiopia, gave birth to their children Nicolas (1990) and Aida (1993). Actor Florian Böhm (1978) is his grandson.
Karlheinz Böhm died in Grödig, Salzburg, Austria. He was 86.
German postcard by WS-Druck, no. F 139. Retail price: 30 Pfg. (Edges cut off).
German postcard by UFA, no. CK-126. Retail price: 30 Pfg. Photo: UFA. Collection: Egbert Barten.
Trailer for Sissi (1955). Source: Kinoweltdvd (YouTube).
Sources: Encyclopedia of European Cinema, Filmportal.de, Wikipedia and
May 29, 2014
Lotti Huber
Lotti Huber (1912-1998) was a German actress, singer, dancer and avant-garde artist. Her breakthrough came late in the 1980s in the cult films by Rosa von Praunheim. Lotti became the star of the Berlin Underground of the 1990s and called her autobiography ‘Diese Zitrone hat noch viel Saft!’(This lemon still has a lot of juice!).
German postcard by Edition Wild, Waldbröl. Photo: Gertrude Garancy. Colouring: Cesa, 1990.
Rassenschande
Lotti Huber was born Charlotte Dora Goldmann (according to IMDb as Regina Rudnick) in Kiel, Germany in 1912. She was the daughter of upper-class Jewish parents and grew up with two brothers, Walter and Kurt (later Ruwen Golan).
As young girl, she became interested in dance and theatre, and took lessons. She was inspired by modern dancers like Isadora Duncan and Mary Wigman. With her lover Hillert Lueken, the son of former Kiel Mayor Emil Lueken , she went to Berlin and lived there with him. Since Lotti was Jewish, Hillert Lueken was arrested and killed by the Nazis in 1937 because of ‘Rassenschande’ (race defilement).
She herself was deported to the Moringen concentration camp and after its dissolution to the Lichtenburg concentration camp. In 1938, through her brother Kurt's commitment she was bought out by a US organization. She went to Haifa in Palestine in exile.
She studied dance and mime and moved with her first husband, British officer Alec Kingaby, through the Middle East. She worked as a dancer in nightclubs and vaudeville. They settled on Cyprus and opened a hotel in Nicosia.
After their divorce Lotti moved to Kyrenia, a port city in northern Cyprus, and ran her own restaurant ‘The Octopus’. There she met her second husband Norman Huber, also a British officer, in 1960. The couple moved to London, and in 1965, Lotti returned to Berlin when Norman was transferred to the Federal Republic of Germany.
After the death of her husband in 1971, Huber had to get by with odd jobs. So she translated romance novels from English, opened an etiquette school in her apartment, sold herb liquor in department stores and worked as a film extra in such films as Schöner Gigolo, armer Gigolo/Just a gigolo (David Hemmings, 1979) starring David Bowie , Die Alptraumfrau/Nightmare Woman (Lothar Lambert, 1981) and the Thomas Mann adaptation Der Zauberberg/The Magic Mountain (Hans W. Geißendörfer, 1982).
German postcard by L.M. Kartenvertrieb, Berlin, no. 01916. Photo: Wilhelm L. Reinke.
Adventurous and outrageous
In 1981, Lotti Huber became known to cinema audiences with Unsere Leichen leben noch/Our Corpses Still Live, directed by the adventurous and outrageous film-maker Rosa von Praunheim.
It made her the diva of Von Praunheim’s cult cinema and she returned in his next films like Stadt der verlorenen Seelen/City of Lost Souls (Rosa von Praunheim, 1983) and Horror Vacui (Rosa von Praunheim, 1984).
She co-wrote the screenplay and took a starring role in Anita - Tänze des Lasters/Anita - Dances of Vice (Rosa von Praunheim, 1988), on the life and career of silent film star and nude dancer Anita Berber .
In 1990, Huber published her autobiography, Diese Zitrone hat noch viel Saft! Ein Leben (This lemon still has a lot of juice! A life). Her best known film is the semi-documentary Affengeil. Eine Reise durch Lottis Leben (Rosa von Praunheim, 1991).
By now, she was considered as the star of the Berlin Underground and had a large following, especially in the gay and lesbian scene. Huber stepped on with solo programs, biographical narratives, dance, cabaret and chanson joined together. She regularly appeared in the TV show Holgers Waschsalon/Holger's Launderette, and other TV programmes.
In later years, she worked with Thom Nowotny as her musical companion, and together they had a television show on the local station TV Berlin. She continued to appear in films like the mockumentary Neurosia – 50 Jahre pervers/Neurosia - Who Shot Rosa von Praunheim (Rosa von Praunheim, 1995) and the TV-production Liebling, vergiss die Socken nicht!/Darling, do not forget the socks! (Tobias Meinecke, 1998). It was her final film appearance.
In 1998, Lotti Huber died of heart failure and was buried at the Jewish cemetery Heerstraße in Berlin, next to her husband Norman Huber.
Short clip with a.o. Lotti Huber and Rosa von Praunheim. Source: absolutMEDIENBerlin (YouTube).
Sources: Rena Jacob (Wider des Vergessens) (German), Wikipedia (German), and .
German postcard by Edition Wild, Waldbröl. Photo: Gertrude Garancy. Colouring: Cesa, 1990.
Rassenschande
Lotti Huber was born Charlotte Dora Goldmann (according to IMDb as Regina Rudnick) in Kiel, Germany in 1912. She was the daughter of upper-class Jewish parents and grew up with two brothers, Walter and Kurt (later Ruwen Golan).
As young girl, she became interested in dance and theatre, and took lessons. She was inspired by modern dancers like Isadora Duncan and Mary Wigman. With her lover Hillert Lueken, the son of former Kiel Mayor Emil Lueken , she went to Berlin and lived there with him. Since Lotti was Jewish, Hillert Lueken was arrested and killed by the Nazis in 1937 because of ‘Rassenschande’ (race defilement).
She herself was deported to the Moringen concentration camp and after its dissolution to the Lichtenburg concentration camp. In 1938, through her brother Kurt's commitment she was bought out by a US organization. She went to Haifa in Palestine in exile.
She studied dance and mime and moved with her first husband, British officer Alec Kingaby, through the Middle East. She worked as a dancer in nightclubs and vaudeville. They settled on Cyprus and opened a hotel in Nicosia.
After their divorce Lotti moved to Kyrenia, a port city in northern Cyprus, and ran her own restaurant ‘The Octopus’. There she met her second husband Norman Huber, also a British officer, in 1960. The couple moved to London, and in 1965, Lotti returned to Berlin when Norman was transferred to the Federal Republic of Germany.
After the death of her husband in 1971, Huber had to get by with odd jobs. So she translated romance novels from English, opened an etiquette school in her apartment, sold herb liquor in department stores and worked as a film extra in such films as Schöner Gigolo, armer Gigolo/Just a gigolo (David Hemmings, 1979) starring David Bowie , Die Alptraumfrau/Nightmare Woman (Lothar Lambert, 1981) and the Thomas Mann adaptation Der Zauberberg/The Magic Mountain (Hans W. Geißendörfer, 1982).
German postcard by L.M. Kartenvertrieb, Berlin, no. 01916. Photo: Wilhelm L. Reinke.
Adventurous and outrageous
In 1981, Lotti Huber became known to cinema audiences with Unsere Leichen leben noch/Our Corpses Still Live, directed by the adventurous and outrageous film-maker Rosa von Praunheim.
It made her the diva of Von Praunheim’s cult cinema and she returned in his next films like Stadt der verlorenen Seelen/City of Lost Souls (Rosa von Praunheim, 1983) and Horror Vacui (Rosa von Praunheim, 1984).
She co-wrote the screenplay and took a starring role in Anita - Tänze des Lasters/Anita - Dances of Vice (Rosa von Praunheim, 1988), on the life and career of silent film star and nude dancer Anita Berber .
In 1990, Huber published her autobiography, Diese Zitrone hat noch viel Saft! Ein Leben (This lemon still has a lot of juice! A life). Her best known film is the semi-documentary Affengeil. Eine Reise durch Lottis Leben (Rosa von Praunheim, 1991).
By now, she was considered as the star of the Berlin Underground and had a large following, especially in the gay and lesbian scene. Huber stepped on with solo programs, biographical narratives, dance, cabaret and chanson joined together. She regularly appeared in the TV show Holgers Waschsalon/Holger's Launderette, and other TV programmes.
In later years, she worked with Thom Nowotny as her musical companion, and together they had a television show on the local station TV Berlin. She continued to appear in films like the mockumentary Neurosia – 50 Jahre pervers/Neurosia - Who Shot Rosa von Praunheim (Rosa von Praunheim, 1995) and the TV-production Liebling, vergiss die Socken nicht!/Darling, do not forget the socks! (Tobias Meinecke, 1998). It was her final film appearance.
In 1998, Lotti Huber died of heart failure and was buried at the Jewish cemetery Heerstraße in Berlin, next to her husband Norman Huber.
Short clip with a.o. Lotti Huber and Rosa von Praunheim. Source: absolutMEDIENBerlin (YouTube).
Sources: Rena Jacob (Wider des Vergessens) (German), Wikipedia (German), and .
May 28, 2014
Christian Wolff
Handsome Christian Wolff (1938) was the young lover of many German films of the late 1950s. He started out in the controversial ‘gay' film Anders als Du und Ich/Bewildered Youth (1957) and became in the 1980s a popular TV star in the long running family series Forsthaus Falkenau.
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 4713. Retail price: 25 Pfg. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Ufa.
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 4170. Retail price: 25 Pfg. Photo: Arca Film / Marszalek / DFH. Publicity still for Es war die erste Liebe/It was the first love (Fritz Stapenhorst, Veit Harlan, 1958).
Austrian postcard by Kellner-Fotokarten, Wien, no. 81066. Photo: Bavaria-Film. Publicity still for Immer wenn der Tag beginnt/Always when the day starts (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1957).
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 3645. Retail price: 25 Pfg. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Ufa.
Austrian postcard by Kellner Fotokarten, Wien, no. 83466. Photo: CIFA / Prisma / FCC. Publicity still for Il bacio del sole/Don Vesuvio (Siro Marcellini, 1958).
Anti-gay
Christian Wolff was born in Berlin in 1938.
Between 1955 and 1957 he studied at the renowned Max-Reinhardt-Schule.
His teacher Hilde Körber helped him to get his first film role opposite Paula Wessely and Paul Dahlke in the anti-gay film Anders als Du und Ich/Bewildered Youth (Veit Harlan, 1957).
The film was made by the notorious Veit Harlan, director of Nazi-propaganda-films like Jud Süß/Jew Süss (1940) and Kolberg (1945).
The film portrays homosexuality as evil and even diabolic. Wolff plays young Klaus, who is drawn to his friend Manfred and explores the underground world in post-war Berlin of gay clubs and electronic music.
His family begins to learn of his other life and does everything to set him straight. The film was shortly after its premiere forbidden.
Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam, no. 4268. Photo: Arca / Cinepress. Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V. was the licency holder for UFA postcards in the Netherlands.
Christian Wolff and Marion Michael . Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam (licency holders for UFA postcards in the Netherlands), no. 4267. Photo: ARCA-Cinepress.
Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam, no. 3846. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Bavaria / Schorcht Film.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag, Minden/Westf., no. 038. Photo: Berolina / Kurt Schulz / Union / Stempka.
German postcard by Rüdel-Verlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 2365. Photo: Bavaria / Schorcht / Brünjes.
Young Romantic Lover
Christian Wolff followed this controversial début up with films like Die Frühreifen/The Prematures (Josef von Báky, 1957) with Heidi Brühl , and Es war die erste Liebe/First Love (Fritz Stapenhorst, 1958) opposite Marion Michael .
In these films he was often typecasted as the young, romantic lover.
A bit more mature were his parts in Der Schinderhannes/Duel in the Forest (Helmut Käutner, 1958) with Curd Jürgens , the war drama Kriegsgericht/Court Martial (Kurt Meisel, 1959), and Der blaue Nachtfalter/The Blue Moth (Wolfgang Schleif, 1959) opposite Zarah Leander .
Then he was again typecast as a lonely prince in the romance Alt Heidelberg/Old Heidelberg (Ernst Marischka, 1959) with Gert Fröbe and Sabine Sinjen .
German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, no. 339. Photo: Bavaria. Publicity still for Immer wenn der Tag beginnt/Always when the Day starts (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1957).
German postcard by Filmbilder-Vertrieb Ernst Freihoff, Essen. Retail price: 10 Pfg. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Ufa.
German postcard by Rüdel-Verlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. D 2548. Photo: Real / Europa / Gabriele. Publicity stills for Der Schinderhannes/Duel in the Forest (Helmut Käutner, 1958).
German autograph card.
German postcard by Filmbilder-Vertrieb Ernst Freihoff, Essen, no. 612. Retail price: 10 Pfg. Photo: Lothar Winkler.
Forsthaus Falkenau
His breakthrough was his role as the student Fabian König in the crime drama Verbrechen nach Schulschluss/The Young Go Wild (Alfred Vohrer, 1959). The then 21-years old actor won the Critics Award at the San Sebastian Film Festival.
His next film, the crime film Am Tag als der Regen kam/The Day It Rained (Gerd Oswald, 1959), was also a success.
In the 1960s followed more popular films like the Carl Zuckmayer adaptation Die Fastnachtsbeichte/The Carnival Confession (William Dieterle, 1960), Via Mala (Paul May, 1961) and Rheinsberg (Kurt Hoffmann, 1967) with Cornelia Froboess .
In 1958 he made his stage debut in a Shakespeare play and until the 1980s he had engagements with theatre companies in Berlin, Düsseldorf and Munich. On stage he easily alternated classic with modern plays.
In the 1970s he also started a busy television career. He did many guest performances and became a popular TV star in the long-running hit series Forsthaus Falkenau (1989-2006). In a final feature episode Entscheidung in der Savanne (Marcus Ulbricht, 2006) his character left his farm in Falkenau for a new farm in Southern Africa, which he had inherited.
Next to his acting jobs, Christian Wolff synchronized Pierre Brice in the Winnetou films, Alain Delon and Anthony Perkins.
Christian Wolff married actress Corny Collins in 1959 and later remarried with Marina Handloser. His son Patrick Wolff is also an actor.
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. CK-256. Retail price: 30 Pfg. Photo: Stempha / ARCA Film.
German postcard, no. F 152.
German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, no. F 167.
German postcard by ISV, no. D 28.
German promotion card by NDF. Photo: Bildarchiv Engelmeier. Still for Forsthaus Falkenau.
Sources: Steffi-line.de, Wikipedia and .
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 4713. Retail price: 25 Pfg. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Ufa.
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 4170. Retail price: 25 Pfg. Photo: Arca Film / Marszalek / DFH. Publicity still for Es war die erste Liebe/It was the first love (Fritz Stapenhorst, Veit Harlan, 1958).
Austrian postcard by Kellner-Fotokarten, Wien, no. 81066. Photo: Bavaria-Film. Publicity still for Immer wenn der Tag beginnt/Always when the day starts (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1957).
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. FK 3645. Retail price: 25 Pfg. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Ufa.
Austrian postcard by Kellner Fotokarten, Wien, no. 83466. Photo: CIFA / Prisma / FCC. Publicity still for Il bacio del sole/Don Vesuvio (Siro Marcellini, 1958).
Anti-gay
Christian Wolff was born in Berlin in 1938.
Between 1955 and 1957 he studied at the renowned Max-Reinhardt-Schule.
His teacher Hilde Körber helped him to get his first film role opposite Paula Wessely and Paul Dahlke in the anti-gay film Anders als Du und Ich/Bewildered Youth (Veit Harlan, 1957).
The film was made by the notorious Veit Harlan, director of Nazi-propaganda-films like Jud Süß/Jew Süss (1940) and Kolberg (1945).
The film portrays homosexuality as evil and even diabolic. Wolff plays young Klaus, who is drawn to his friend Manfred and explores the underground world in post-war Berlin of gay clubs and electronic music.
His family begins to learn of his other life and does everything to set him straight. The film was shortly after its premiere forbidden.
Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam, no. 4268. Photo: Arca / Cinepress. Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V. was the licency holder for UFA postcards in the Netherlands.
Christian Wolff and Marion Michael . Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam (licency holders for UFA postcards in the Netherlands), no. 4267. Photo: ARCA-Cinepress.
Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg N.V., Rotterdam, no. 3846. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Bavaria / Schorcht Film.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag, Minden/Westf., no. 038. Photo: Berolina / Kurt Schulz / Union / Stempka.
German postcard by Rüdel-Verlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 2365. Photo: Bavaria / Schorcht / Brünjes.
Young Romantic Lover
Christian Wolff followed this controversial début up with films like Die Frühreifen/The Prematures (Josef von Báky, 1957) with Heidi Brühl , and Es war die erste Liebe/First Love (Fritz Stapenhorst, 1958) opposite Marion Michael .
In these films he was often typecasted as the young, romantic lover.
A bit more mature were his parts in Der Schinderhannes/Duel in the Forest (Helmut Käutner, 1958) with Curd Jürgens , the war drama Kriegsgericht/Court Martial (Kurt Meisel, 1959), and Der blaue Nachtfalter/The Blue Moth (Wolfgang Schleif, 1959) opposite Zarah Leander .
Then he was again typecast as a lonely prince in the romance Alt Heidelberg/Old Heidelberg (Ernst Marischka, 1959) with Gert Fröbe and Sabine Sinjen .
German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, no. 339. Photo: Bavaria. Publicity still for Immer wenn der Tag beginnt/Always when the Day starts (Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1957).
German postcard by Filmbilder-Vertrieb Ernst Freihoff, Essen. Retail price: 10 Pfg. Photo: Arthur Grimm / Ufa.
German postcard by Rüdel-Verlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. D 2548. Photo: Real / Europa / Gabriele. Publicity stills for Der Schinderhannes/Duel in the Forest (Helmut Käutner, 1958).
German autograph card.
German postcard by Filmbilder-Vertrieb Ernst Freihoff, Essen, no. 612. Retail price: 10 Pfg. Photo: Lothar Winkler.
Forsthaus Falkenau
His breakthrough was his role as the student Fabian König in the crime drama Verbrechen nach Schulschluss/The Young Go Wild (Alfred Vohrer, 1959). The then 21-years old actor won the Critics Award at the San Sebastian Film Festival.
His next film, the crime film Am Tag als der Regen kam/The Day It Rained (Gerd Oswald, 1959), was also a success.
In the 1960s followed more popular films like the Carl Zuckmayer adaptation Die Fastnachtsbeichte/The Carnival Confession (William Dieterle, 1960), Via Mala (Paul May, 1961) and Rheinsberg (Kurt Hoffmann, 1967) with Cornelia Froboess .
In 1958 he made his stage debut in a Shakespeare play and until the 1980s he had engagements with theatre companies in Berlin, Düsseldorf and Munich. On stage he easily alternated classic with modern plays.
In the 1970s he also started a busy television career. He did many guest performances and became a popular TV star in the long-running hit series Forsthaus Falkenau (1989-2006). In a final feature episode Entscheidung in der Savanne (Marcus Ulbricht, 2006) his character left his farm in Falkenau for a new farm in Southern Africa, which he had inherited.
Next to his acting jobs, Christian Wolff synchronized Pierre Brice in the Winnetou films, Alain Delon and Anthony Perkins.
Christian Wolff married actress Corny Collins in 1959 and later remarried with Marina Handloser. His son Patrick Wolff is also an actor.
German postcard by Ufa, Berlin-Tempelhof, no. CK-256. Retail price: 30 Pfg. Photo: Stempha / ARCA Film.
German postcard, no. F 152.
German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, no. F 167.
German postcard by ISV, no. D 28.
German promotion card by NDF. Photo: Bildarchiv Engelmeier. Still for Forsthaus Falkenau.
Sources: Steffi-line.de, Wikipedia and .
May 27, 2014
Lucia Bosé
Lucia Bosé (1931) is an Italian actress, famous for her films from the 1950s with a.o. Giuseppe De Santis and Michelangelo Antonioni. In the same years and after she also worked with other famous directors such as Bardem, Maselli, Bunuel, the Taviani's, Cavani, Duras, Rosi and Ozpetek.
Italian postcard in the series Divi del Cinema by Vetta Traldi, Milano, no. 7.
Miss Italy
Lucia Bosè was born Lucia Borloni in Milan, Italy in 1931. She comes from a peasant and working-class family and began to work at the age of twelve years. She was first a messenger for a law firm, later a clerk in Milan's fine pastry shop Galli.
In 1947 she participated in the first Miss Italy pageant, where she was able to win against competitors like Gianna Maria Canale , Eleonora Rossi Drago and Gina Lollobrigida .
Had Giuseppe De Santis still preferred Silvana Mangano for Riso amaro/Bitter Rice (1949), he chose Bosè in his next film, Non c'è pace tra gli ulivi/No peace among the olive trees (Giuseppe De Santis, 1950), a typical neorealist film about a poor shepherd ( Raf Vallone ) who tries steal back his sheep stolen from him while he was at war.
In the same year Bosé starred oposite Massimo Girotti in the well-to-do set, modernist crime story and drama Cronaca di un amore/Story of a love affair (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1950). It was Antonioni's first full length feature film, about an adulterous couple plotting to kill her husband.
Numerous screen engagements followed. Antonioni cast her again in La signora senza camelie/The Lady Without Camelias (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1953) about a newly discovered starlet and her experiences of in the Italian cinema. Juan Bardem cast her in Muerte di un ciclista/Death of a Cyclist (1955) about an adulterous couple which runs over a cyclist and leaves him to die. Bosè also acted in Francesco Maselli's debut Gli sbandati/The Abandoned (1955) and Luis Bunuel's Cela s'appelle l'aurore (1956).
Italian postcard by Italfoto, no. 162.
Bullfighter
In 1955 Luci Bosè married Luis Miguel Dominguín, a five years older, popular Spanish bullfighter and occasional actor. From the marriage, which ended in a divorce in 1967, sprang three children, two of whom - Paola Dominguin and Miguel Bosé - are also active as actors. Luchino Visconti was godfather to her son Miguel, Pablo Picasso to her daughter Paola.
At the time, Lucia Bosè lived in Spain and put her career on halt, except for a sporadic appearance in Le testament d'Orphée/Testament of Orpheus (Jean Cocteau, 1959).
In 1968 Bosè returned to film acting after almost a ten year break and worked first in Spain and afterwards in Italy. There she worked among others in Federico Fellini's Satyricon (1969), the Taviani Brothers' Sotto il segno dello scorpione/Under the Sign of Scorpio (1969), and Liliana Cavani's L'ospite/The Guest (1972).
Other interesting films with her were Nathalie Granger (Marguerite Duras, 1972), Lumière ( Jeanne Moreau , 1976) and Violanta (Daniel Schmid, 1977).
After 1978, she acted significantly less, but remained active, also on television. She had memorable film performances in Cronaca di una morte annunciata/Chronicle of a Death Foretold (Francesco Rosi, 1987) starring Rupert Everett , El niño de la Luna/Moon Child (Agustí Villaronga, 1989), Harem suaré/Harem (Ferzan Özpetek, 1999) and I vicerè/The Viceroy (Roberto Faenza, 2007).
Her most recent screen appearance was in Alfonsina y el mar/Alfonsina and the sea (Albert Sordella, 2013), as an 80-year-old actress who returns to the small Chilean town of her youth to fulfill her father's dream of creating a TV channel in a place which has never known television.
Scene from Cronaca di un amore/Story of a love affair (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1950). Source: 藤原敏史(YouTube).
Sources: Wikipedia (German, English and Italian) and
Italian postcard in the series Divi del Cinema by Vetta Traldi, Milano, no. 7.
Miss Italy
Lucia Bosè was born Lucia Borloni in Milan, Italy in 1931. She comes from a peasant and working-class family and began to work at the age of twelve years. She was first a messenger for a law firm, later a clerk in Milan's fine pastry shop Galli.
In 1947 she participated in the first Miss Italy pageant, where she was able to win against competitors like Gianna Maria Canale , Eleonora Rossi Drago and Gina Lollobrigida .
Had Giuseppe De Santis still preferred Silvana Mangano for Riso amaro/Bitter Rice (1949), he chose Bosè in his next film, Non c'è pace tra gli ulivi/No peace among the olive trees (Giuseppe De Santis, 1950), a typical neorealist film about a poor shepherd ( Raf Vallone ) who tries steal back his sheep stolen from him while he was at war.
In the same year Bosé starred oposite Massimo Girotti in the well-to-do set, modernist crime story and drama Cronaca di un amore/Story of a love affair (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1950). It was Antonioni's first full length feature film, about an adulterous couple plotting to kill her husband.
Numerous screen engagements followed. Antonioni cast her again in La signora senza camelie/The Lady Without Camelias (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1953) about a newly discovered starlet and her experiences of in the Italian cinema. Juan Bardem cast her in Muerte di un ciclista/Death of a Cyclist (1955) about an adulterous couple which runs over a cyclist and leaves him to die. Bosè also acted in Francesco Maselli's debut Gli sbandati/The Abandoned (1955) and Luis Bunuel's Cela s'appelle l'aurore (1956).
Italian postcard by Italfoto, no. 162.
Bullfighter
In 1955 Luci Bosè married Luis Miguel Dominguín, a five years older, popular Spanish bullfighter and occasional actor. From the marriage, which ended in a divorce in 1967, sprang three children, two of whom - Paola Dominguin and Miguel Bosé - are also active as actors. Luchino Visconti was godfather to her son Miguel, Pablo Picasso to her daughter Paola.
At the time, Lucia Bosè lived in Spain and put her career on halt, except for a sporadic appearance in Le testament d'Orphée/Testament of Orpheus (Jean Cocteau, 1959).
In 1968 Bosè returned to film acting after almost a ten year break and worked first in Spain and afterwards in Italy. There she worked among others in Federico Fellini's Satyricon (1969), the Taviani Brothers' Sotto il segno dello scorpione/Under the Sign of Scorpio (1969), and Liliana Cavani's L'ospite/The Guest (1972).
Other interesting films with her were Nathalie Granger (Marguerite Duras, 1972), Lumière ( Jeanne Moreau , 1976) and Violanta (Daniel Schmid, 1977).
After 1978, she acted significantly less, but remained active, also on television. She had memorable film performances in Cronaca di una morte annunciata/Chronicle of a Death Foretold (Francesco Rosi, 1987) starring Rupert Everett , El niño de la Luna/Moon Child (Agustí Villaronga, 1989), Harem suaré/Harem (Ferzan Özpetek, 1999) and I vicerè/The Viceroy (Roberto Faenza, 2007).
Her most recent screen appearance was in Alfonsina y el mar/Alfonsina and the sea (Albert Sordella, 2013), as an 80-year-old actress who returns to the small Chilean town of her youth to fulfill her father's dream of creating a TV channel in a place which has never known television.
Scene from Cronaca di un amore/Story of a love affair (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1950). Source: 藤原敏史(YouTube).
Sources: Wikipedia (German, English and Italian) and
May 26, 2014
Marcel Mouloudji
At the age of 16, French actor and singer-songwriter (Marcel) Mouloudji (1922-1994) was already a film star. Angelic and raven-curled, he appeared in one film after another, but he is now best remembered for his politically engaged songs, among which Boris Vian's masterpiece Le Déserteur. He was a free and libertarian artist who explored cinema, theatre, painting, writing and of course music.
French postcard by Editions du Globe, Paris, no. 204. Photo: Studio Harcourt.
French postcard by Editions P.I., no. 1008, presented by Les Carbones Korès 'Carboplane'. Photo: Studio Vallois.
Red Falcons
Marcel Mouloudji was born in Paris in 1922. His father, Said Mouloudji, came from Algeria, where he had worked as a shepherd and farmer before he moved to Paris. In France he became a mason and joined the Communist party. He married a young Breton cleaning woman who was a devote Catholic and bore him two sons, Andre and Marcel.
Marcel went with his father to the Communist Party meetings, a party which he felt close to part of his life. Rather a cute child, he got a role in the film Ménilmontant (René Guissart, 1936) at the age of eleven. Besides this, he worked many odd jobs on the street with his brother André, such as a singer. They enlisted in the Communist youth group Faucons Rouges (Red Falcons) where Marcel and Andre entertained with songs and sketches, and with anti-Fascist, anti-military ballads.
In 1935 Marcel met Sylvain Itkine, director of Le Groupe Octobre, an organization affiliated with the Fédération des Théâtres ouvriers de France (French federation of working class theatre). It was then at only the age of thirteen that he had already met the great names in theatre like Jean-Louis Barrault and Roger Blin.
His illiterate father lived in a small room after his wife went mad and had to be interned, and he was unable to raise his two sons of which the eldest was very ill. Thus during his adolescence, Marcel was hosted for a period by Jean-Louis Barrault , who introduced him to the art world of Paris.
Mouloudji (who came to be known by his surname alone) also took classes with Charles Dullin . In 1936, he performed in his first show Le tableau des Merveilles (The Table of Wonders) inspired by Cervantes and adapted in French by Jacques Prévert. At this time, he took part in a large artistic solidarity movement during the great strikes of 1936. This is how with many other artists he played in factories among other places.
In parallel to the theatre, Mouloudji started in cinema. Through Jacques Prévert, he met Marcel Carné who gave him a small role as a street singer in Jenny (Marcel Carné, 1936) with Francoise Rosay . He then did one film after another. One of the most famous was Les Disparus de St. Agil/Boy’s School (Christian-Jaque, 1938) with Erich von Stroheim . At sixteen, tall, raven-curled and angelic Mouloudji was already a star of the French cinema.
Vintage postcard.
French postcard by Edition du Globe (EDUG), Paris, no. 249. Photo: Studio Harcourt.
Saint-Germain-des-Pres
At the beginning of the Second World War, Mouloudji fled with the Groupe Octobre to the South of France, to Marseille in the unoccupied zone. On this occasion, he met the singer Francis Lemarque. Despite the chaos of the time, he continued working. He had another film success at the side of Raimu in Les Inconnus dans la maison/Strangers in the House (Henri Decoin, 1942) based on a script by Henri-Georges Clouzot in which Mouloudji played an assassin.
Thanks to his brother André, Mouloudji avoided doing the Service du Travail Obligatoire (Mandatory work service). Quickly, he returned to Paris where he did a ton of odd jobs semi-clandestinely. He sang at the Bœuf sur le Toit and discovered the artistic milieu of Saint-Germain-des-Pres.
Mouloudji became one of the leading lights of Parisian literary and theatrical life, and was a regular at the table of Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir at the Café Flore and at other Saint-Germain hangouts. Keeping company with the literary world drove him to write a novel, Enrico (1945), at only 20. This book with childhood memories was awarded with the new Prix de la Pléiade (the prize of the Pleiades).
In 1943, Mouloudji had met Louise Fouquet, known as Lola-la-Brune, whom he married. She would be his wife and artistic agent until 1969. After the war, he became seriously interested in music and sang songs by Boris Vian or Jacques Prevert in fashionable cabarets.
Meanwhile he also could be seen in such films as Boule de Suif/Angel and Sinner (Christian-Jaque, 1947) with Micheline Presle, Eaux troubles/Troubled Waters (Henri Calef, 1949) as himself, and Nous sommes tous des assassins/We Are All Murderers (Andre Cayatte, 1952), a strong polemic against the death penalty. He had his first hit song with his interpretation of La Complainte des infidèles (The Rime of the infidels), a song from the film La Maison Bonnadieu/The House Bonnadieu (Carlo Rim, 1951).
Jacques Canetti, a famous talent agent and owner of the cabaret Les Trois Baudets (The Three Donkeys) lead Mouloudji to success. He let him record Comme un p'tit coquelicot (As a little poppy), which won the Grand Prix du Disque in 1953 and the Prix Charles-Cros in 1952 and 1953. He had the same success in 1954 with Un jour tu verras (One day you'll see), a song from the film Secrets d'alcôve/The Bed (Ralph Habib a.o., 1954).
Another highlight was the provocative anti-war song Le Deserteur (The Deserter), written by Boris Vian. In 1956, at the height of the implication of France in the Indochina War in Vietnam, the song was banned as disruptive to national security and morale. The recording was removed from the shops, and forbidden on the radio.
However, music would now take the first place in Mouloudji's life, and more and more he wrote his own lyrics. In 1958 he made two of his last appearances in the cinema, in Rafles sur la ville/Sinners of Paris (Pierre Chenal, 1958) with Charles Vanel , and in the Hispano-Swedish film Llegaron dos hombres/Two Men in Town (Eusebio Fernández Ardavín, Arne Mattsson, 1958) with Ulla Jacobsson .
French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 343. Photo: Staval.
French postcard by PJB. Photo: disques Philips.
Remaining Honest
After having signed with Vogue records in 1961, Mouloudji finally created his own record label in the form of a cooperative. In 1965 he launched thus Graeme Allwright, a young New Zealander living in France. Not inclined to melt into the record industry, Mouloudji didn't have the success that he had had in the cinema during the 1950s. In 1966, he even opened a hair salon.
When the events of May '68 took place it was the political activist who sang in the factories like he had done in 1936. Remaining honest and not sacrificing his convictions for his career was essential for him. In 1970, Mouloudji appeared on stage at the Theatre de la Porte Saint-Martin in the musical La Neige en été (Snow in summer).
Mouloudji returned to the first ranks as a singer with an anti-Establishment song that Boris Vian had written in 1952 but that did not achieve success until Mouloudji's 1971 recording: the title Allons z'enfants (Come On Children) is a sly dig at the first words of the French national anthem. Mouloudji received again the Prix Charles-Cros in 1974, now as a tribute to his recordings, and a second Grand Prix du Disque in 1977.
In 1976, he recorded with the accordionist Marcel Azzola an anthology of the musette, Et ça tournait (And it revolved). In 1980 he released the album Inconnus Inconnues (Unknown Unknown) and he gave countless concerts throughout the country, but the media hardly noticed it. Tired, he devoted more time to writing and painting, his first loves. He published his childhood memories, that mingle wry humour and nostalgia: Le Petit Invité (The Little Guest) in 1989, La Fleur de l'âge (The Flower of age) in 1991 and Le Coquelicot (The Poppy) in 1997.
In 1992, a pleurisy took away part of his voice. This did not stop him from recording a new album which however would never be completed. Marcel Mouloudji died in Paris in 1994. He had two children: Gregory Mouloudji (1960) with Lilia Lejpuner in 1960 and with Nicolle Tessier, Annabelle Mouloudji (1967), who herself interpreted several songs including Fly Lawrence of Arabia during the 1980s. Lilianne Patrick was his last companion.
In his Obituary in The Independent , James Kirkup commemorates Mouloudji thus: “Marcel Mouloudji started as a street urchin and a street singer, and his long career always reflected those early beginnings. He was a real Paris sparrow, light and quick, agile, graceful and symbolic of a certain romanticism of the working-class city streets, with a style that was very pure, direct and heartfelt. A male Piaf.”
Scopitone film from 1955 with Mouloudji singing La Complainte de la butte. Source: Konshito (YouTube).
Mouloudji sings Allons z'enfants. Source: ColonelHarry (YouTube).
Sources: James Kirkup (The Independent), Olivier Duboc (AllMusic), RFI Musique, Wikipedia (French) and .
French postcard by Editions du Globe, Paris, no. 204. Photo: Studio Harcourt.
French postcard by Editions P.I., no. 1008, presented by Les Carbones Korès 'Carboplane'. Photo: Studio Vallois.
Red Falcons
Marcel Mouloudji was born in Paris in 1922. His father, Said Mouloudji, came from Algeria, where he had worked as a shepherd and farmer before he moved to Paris. In France he became a mason and joined the Communist party. He married a young Breton cleaning woman who was a devote Catholic and bore him two sons, Andre and Marcel.
Marcel went with his father to the Communist Party meetings, a party which he felt close to part of his life. Rather a cute child, he got a role in the film Ménilmontant (René Guissart, 1936) at the age of eleven. Besides this, he worked many odd jobs on the street with his brother André, such as a singer. They enlisted in the Communist youth group Faucons Rouges (Red Falcons) where Marcel and Andre entertained with songs and sketches, and with anti-Fascist, anti-military ballads.
In 1935 Marcel met Sylvain Itkine, director of Le Groupe Octobre, an organization affiliated with the Fédération des Théâtres ouvriers de France (French federation of working class theatre). It was then at only the age of thirteen that he had already met the great names in theatre like Jean-Louis Barrault and Roger Blin.
His illiterate father lived in a small room after his wife went mad and had to be interned, and he was unable to raise his two sons of which the eldest was very ill. Thus during his adolescence, Marcel was hosted for a period by Jean-Louis Barrault , who introduced him to the art world of Paris.
Mouloudji (who came to be known by his surname alone) also took classes with Charles Dullin . In 1936, he performed in his first show Le tableau des Merveilles (The Table of Wonders) inspired by Cervantes and adapted in French by Jacques Prévert. At this time, he took part in a large artistic solidarity movement during the great strikes of 1936. This is how with many other artists he played in factories among other places.
In parallel to the theatre, Mouloudji started in cinema. Through Jacques Prévert, he met Marcel Carné who gave him a small role as a street singer in Jenny (Marcel Carné, 1936) with Francoise Rosay . He then did one film after another. One of the most famous was Les Disparus de St. Agil/Boy’s School (Christian-Jaque, 1938) with Erich von Stroheim . At sixteen, tall, raven-curled and angelic Mouloudji was already a star of the French cinema.
Vintage postcard.
French postcard by Edition du Globe (EDUG), Paris, no. 249. Photo: Studio Harcourt.
Saint-Germain-des-Pres
At the beginning of the Second World War, Mouloudji fled with the Groupe Octobre to the South of France, to Marseille in the unoccupied zone. On this occasion, he met the singer Francis Lemarque. Despite the chaos of the time, he continued working. He had another film success at the side of Raimu in Les Inconnus dans la maison/Strangers in the House (Henri Decoin, 1942) based on a script by Henri-Georges Clouzot in which Mouloudji played an assassin.
Thanks to his brother André, Mouloudji avoided doing the Service du Travail Obligatoire (Mandatory work service). Quickly, he returned to Paris where he did a ton of odd jobs semi-clandestinely. He sang at the Bœuf sur le Toit and discovered the artistic milieu of Saint-Germain-des-Pres.
Mouloudji became one of the leading lights of Parisian literary and theatrical life, and was a regular at the table of Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir at the Café Flore and at other Saint-Germain hangouts. Keeping company with the literary world drove him to write a novel, Enrico (1945), at only 20. This book with childhood memories was awarded with the new Prix de la Pléiade (the prize of the Pleiades).
In 1943, Mouloudji had met Louise Fouquet, known as Lola-la-Brune, whom he married. She would be his wife and artistic agent until 1969. After the war, he became seriously interested in music and sang songs by Boris Vian or Jacques Prevert in fashionable cabarets.
Meanwhile he also could be seen in such films as Boule de Suif/Angel and Sinner (Christian-Jaque, 1947) with Micheline Presle, Eaux troubles/Troubled Waters (Henri Calef, 1949) as himself, and Nous sommes tous des assassins/We Are All Murderers (Andre Cayatte, 1952), a strong polemic against the death penalty. He had his first hit song with his interpretation of La Complainte des infidèles (The Rime of the infidels), a song from the film La Maison Bonnadieu/The House Bonnadieu (Carlo Rim, 1951).
Jacques Canetti, a famous talent agent and owner of the cabaret Les Trois Baudets (The Three Donkeys) lead Mouloudji to success. He let him record Comme un p'tit coquelicot (As a little poppy), which won the Grand Prix du Disque in 1953 and the Prix Charles-Cros in 1952 and 1953. He had the same success in 1954 with Un jour tu verras (One day you'll see), a song from the film Secrets d'alcôve/The Bed (Ralph Habib a.o., 1954).
Another highlight was the provocative anti-war song Le Deserteur (The Deserter), written by Boris Vian. In 1956, at the height of the implication of France in the Indochina War in Vietnam, the song was banned as disruptive to national security and morale. The recording was removed from the shops, and forbidden on the radio.
However, music would now take the first place in Mouloudji's life, and more and more he wrote his own lyrics. In 1958 he made two of his last appearances in the cinema, in Rafles sur la ville/Sinners of Paris (Pierre Chenal, 1958) with Charles Vanel , and in the Hispano-Swedish film Llegaron dos hombres/Two Men in Town (Eusebio Fernández Ardavín, Arne Mattsson, 1958) with Ulla Jacobsson .
French postcard by Editions P.I., Paris, no. 343. Photo: Staval.
French postcard by PJB. Photo: disques Philips.
Remaining Honest
After having signed with Vogue records in 1961, Mouloudji finally created his own record label in the form of a cooperative. In 1965 he launched thus Graeme Allwright, a young New Zealander living in France. Not inclined to melt into the record industry, Mouloudji didn't have the success that he had had in the cinema during the 1950s. In 1966, he even opened a hair salon.
When the events of May '68 took place it was the political activist who sang in the factories like he had done in 1936. Remaining honest and not sacrificing his convictions for his career was essential for him. In 1970, Mouloudji appeared on stage at the Theatre de la Porte Saint-Martin in the musical La Neige en été (Snow in summer).
Mouloudji returned to the first ranks as a singer with an anti-Establishment song that Boris Vian had written in 1952 but that did not achieve success until Mouloudji's 1971 recording: the title Allons z'enfants (Come On Children) is a sly dig at the first words of the French national anthem. Mouloudji received again the Prix Charles-Cros in 1974, now as a tribute to his recordings, and a second Grand Prix du Disque in 1977.
In 1976, he recorded with the accordionist Marcel Azzola an anthology of the musette, Et ça tournait (And it revolved). In 1980 he released the album Inconnus Inconnues (Unknown Unknown) and he gave countless concerts throughout the country, but the media hardly noticed it. Tired, he devoted more time to writing and painting, his first loves. He published his childhood memories, that mingle wry humour and nostalgia: Le Petit Invité (The Little Guest) in 1989, La Fleur de l'âge (The Flower of age) in 1991 and Le Coquelicot (The Poppy) in 1997.
In 1992, a pleurisy took away part of his voice. This did not stop him from recording a new album which however would never be completed. Marcel Mouloudji died in Paris in 1994. He had two children: Gregory Mouloudji (1960) with Lilia Lejpuner in 1960 and with Nicolle Tessier, Annabelle Mouloudji (1967), who herself interpreted several songs including Fly Lawrence of Arabia during the 1980s. Lilianne Patrick was his last companion.
In his Obituary in The Independent , James Kirkup commemorates Mouloudji thus: “Marcel Mouloudji started as a street urchin and a street singer, and his long career always reflected those early beginnings. He was a real Paris sparrow, light and quick, agile, graceful and symbolic of a certain romanticism of the working-class city streets, with a style that was very pure, direct and heartfelt. A male Piaf.”
Scopitone film from 1955 with Mouloudji singing La Complainte de la butte. Source: Konshito (YouTube).
Mouloudji sings Allons z'enfants. Source: ColonelHarry (YouTube).
Sources: James Kirkup (The Independent), Olivier Duboc (AllMusic), RFI Musique, Wikipedia (French) and .
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