Curt Becker (director)

Heinrich Wilhelm Curt Becker (* 7. January 1903 in Hamburg , † 11. May 1976 ibid ) was a German dancer and dance master, actor and theater director , broadcaster and radio director

Professional development

Curt Becker grew up with 5 younger sisters in a middle-class family in Hamburg-Hohenfelde . After completing elementary school, including the Selekta advanced class , the Weber & Guhl company in Hamburg trained him as a forwarding agent . In 1922 he was traveling in Germany as a young wandering bird .

In 1923 he joined the dance teacher, choreographer and dance theorist Rudolf von Laban in Hamburg . In the Laban School he was trained as an expressive dancer, participated in performances on the Laban stage and was assisted by Laban. From 1926 to 1930 he appeared as a dancer under his own name and studied performances at several North German theaters as a dance master, including at the Deutsches Schauspielhaus Hamburg, which cooperated with the Laban stage. He also led dance courses for lay people. In 1927/28 he was engaged by the Heidelberg City Theater as a dancer and dance master.

His work as an actor began with small roles on stages where he appeared as a dancer. There are only isolated references to an acting training in Hamburg, probably from 1931 to 1933. From 1933/34 to the summer of 1939 he was engaged as an actor on different stages, first in Hamburg, Harburg and Altona , then mainly in Bavaria, Saxony and Silesia. At some of these stages he also staged plays as a director, for example at the Bavarian State Theater in Munich , the Saxon State Theater in Dresden and the Oberschlesisches Landestheater Beuthen .

In 1932/33 Bercker trained as a radio operator in Hamburg and in 1933 took part in radio productions by Norddeutsche Rundfunk GmbH in Hamburg, including radio plays for school radio and in Low German, of which he spoke several dialects . Occasionally he took on radio speaking roles from 1934 parallel to the theater work that was in the foreground. Radio activity gained increasing importance when, after marriage to actress Trude Eger and the birth of two children in 1938 and 1939, Dresden became a family residence. From 1938 to 1940, he was employed by the Leipzig secondary station in Dresden for the production of radio plays, reports and features .

In mid-1940 the Wehrmacht called him for basic infantry training and used him as a tank soldier until 1943. After training as a radio reporter (war reporter), he belonged to the propaganda company 695 until the end of World War II .

After a short captivity , Curt Becker returned to Hamburg and was hired by the British military administration as a producer (radio director) for the NWDR in September 1945 , which was transferred to German responsibility in 1948 and, as NDR, its broadcasting area to Hamburg, Lower Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein in 1955 limited. ((History of radio)) In the early years, his directorial duties included a wide range of different broadcast formats, but soon they focused on school radio. For this he produced audio documentations composed of narrative passages and play scenes, especially on "Science and Technology" and "Discoveries and Travel", each in close cooperation with the authors of the manuscripts (such as Frank Leberecht, Fritz Raab), the assistant directors and sound engineers, with high demands on the authenticity of the scene noises and the conciseness of dialogue of his programs for a young audience. He took a lively interest in the theater life in Hamburg, to which the speakers he appointed were mostly actors, and was involved in trade unions. After retiring in 1968, he took on freelance directing tasks until 1973 (children's records, advertising and industrial films).

Becker worked for the NWDR and headed the radio plays department of the NDR for several years. Curt Becker's colleague was Helga Boddin .

Becker belonged to the art union . In 1950 he contributed to the creation of the Funk group .

Curt Becker was in the family grave, tomb 48-6-21 on the cemetery Hamburg Ohlsdorf  buried.

References

• Hedwig Müller and Patricia Stöckmann “'Everyone is a dancer'. Expressive dance in Germany between 1900 and 1945 ”, Gießen, 1993
• Deutsches Schauspielhaus (Ed.) “100 Years of the Deutsches Schauspielhaus in Hamburg”, Hamburg, 1999

Radio plays

Productions directed by Curt Becker:

• Frank Leberecht: Sparks in the distance . Speaker: Carl Voscherau et al. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: May 26, 1953.
• Jack London : A son of the sun . Speaker: Carl-Heinz Schroth , Carl Voscherau. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: March 13, 1950.
• Guntram Prüfer : Fridtjof Nansen . A current European legend . Speaker: Friedrich Schütter et al. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: June 30, 1950.
• Dieter Rohkohl : Stroll through December . Speaker: Wolf Martini , Heinz Piper . Music: Gerhard Gregor . Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: January 6, 1951.
• Dieter Rohkohl: Stroll through January . Speaker: Wolf Martini, Heinz Piper, Viola Wahlen . Music: Gerhard Gregor. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: February 3, 1951.
• Dieter Rohkohl: Stroll through February . Speaker: Wolf Martini, Heinz Piper. Music: Gerhard Gregor. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: March 3, 1951.
• Dieter Rohkohl: Stroll through April . Speaker: Wolf Martini, Heinz Piper. Music: Gerhard Gregor. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: April 30, 1951.
• Dieter Rohkohl: Stroll through May . Speaker: Wolf Martini, Heinz Piper. Music: Gerhard Gregor. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: June 3, 1951.
• Dieter Rohkohl: Stroll through November . Speaker: Hans Fitze , Wolf Martini. Music: Gerhard Gregor. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: December 4th 1950.
• Paul Schurek : De political cans . Speaker: Heinz Roggenkamp , Carl Voscherau. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: March 25, 1946.
• Paul Schurek: Stratenmusik . Speaker: Alexander Hunzinger , Heidi Kabel , Carl Voscherau. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: July 8, 1946.
• Fritz Wichmann: Hello to de Koh . Speaker: Hans Mahler , Carl Voscherau. Prod .: NWDR, first broadcast: September 30, 1946.
• Conny in the zoo , children's musical. Speaker: Werner Riepel et al

Web links

• ARD audio game database , accessed on January 14, 2020.

Individual evidence

1. ^ "The right hand" ( memento from August 19, 2017 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on January 14, 2020.
2. ↑ 50 years ago: Founding of the Funk group , accessed on January 14, 2020.