Fien de la Mar

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Fien de la Mar (before 1942)
Fien with her father Nap (1930)
Opening of the Theater de la Mar in 1947
De la Mar (r.) In 1984 while filming (with Jasperina de Jong )

Josephina Johanna "Fien" de la Mar (born January 2, 1898 in Amsterdam , † April 23, 1965 ibid) was a Dutch actress and chanteuse . She is one of the few Dutch " divas ".

biography

Fien de la Mar was the daughter of the actress Clasina Margaretha Klopper and the actor and director Napoleon Christiaan de la Mar, known as Nap . The de la Mar family were Jewish - Sephardic and originally from Morocco ; the ancestor Masahod had been the king's ambassador and had settled in Amsterdam in 1775.

The grandfather Charles de la Mar was a great admirer of Napoleon Bonaparte , which is why he named his son after him, who in turn gave his daughter the first name of Bonaparte's first wife Joséphine de Beauharnais . Since the parents were on the road a lot for work, Fien grew up mainly with her grandparents and her maternal aunts. She received lessons in singing, dancing and playing the piano.

A few months before completing the Hogereburgerschool , Fien de la Mar dropped out of school in order to be on stage from now on. She was first known by the first name "Fientje" until after 1945 she no longer wanted to be called that. In 1916 she had one of her first appearances with Louis Davids in the revue Had je me maar and with her parents in the operetta Madorah, which was written especially for her . In the following years she played in Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw (1928) with her father in the role of Doolittle , in The Grave of the Unknown Soldier by Paul Raynal (1928) and in Minna by Barnhelm von Lessing . She showed her versatility by performing as a chanteuse and singing chansons in French and English, "with the special charm of a true diva". From the 1930s onwards she starred in eight of the 37 pre-war Dutch films and became known to a wider audience. The father she admired, Nap de la Mar, died on July 4, 1930 at the age of 52 in a psychiatric facility in Den Dolder .

Fien de la Mar lived excessively: she had problems with alcohol and often changed lovers. She was considered unpredictable and spoiled, she insulted and hit colleagues. Although her beauty and skill were highlighted again and again, she was plagued by self-doubt and could not accept compliments. One of her lovers described her as a "longing, nervous girl" who was not looking for sex, but confirmation. In 1941 she married the architect Pieter Hermanus Groussow, with whom she had lived for several years; marriage gave her stability but remained childless. Although Fien de la Mar continued to have lovers and her husband should not have been faithful either, the marriage was considered happy.

In 1940 de la Mar shot her last film: Ergens in Nederland alongside Lily Bouwmeester and Jan de Hartog . In 1943 she refused to join the Nederlandsche Kultuurkamer (analogous to the Reichskulturkammer ) and was therefore not allowed to work in her profession during the occupation by the Germans . Her grandfather Charles was married to a non-Jewish woman, which is why Fien de la Mar had only one Jewish grandparent and therefore nothing to fear from the Nazi authorities because of her origin.

After the end of the occupation, Fien de la Mar was successful again as an actress and chanteuse. In 1947 she and her husband opened their own theater De la Mar near Leidseplein in Amsterdam , named after Nap de la Mar. The theater was located in the formerly burnt-out Nieuwe Spieghelschool in the Marnixstraat, which Groussow had rebuilt. During the occupation by the Germans, there was a work office in the building that had been blown up by Dutch resistance fighters, who also killed five employees. In retaliation, five Dutch people were executed by the Germans in front of the burned-out building on January 6, 1945, which is why a memorial was placed in front of it in 1947.

The theater was a financial failure, de la Mar described it as a "debacle". In 1952 it was taken over by Wim Sonneveld , who renamed the theater the Niewe de la Mar Theater . Fien de la Mar was deeply disappointed and withdrew from the stage: "I just wanted to grow old with my husband." For years she refused to enter the theater again. The couple now increasingly spent their days together at the counters of artist pubs such as Café Schiller on Rembrandtplein .

In 1957, Pieter Groussouw, who had always given Fien de la Mar a hold, died. His widow then made an unsuccessful suicide attempt by cutting open her wrists and turning on the gas tap. She was admitted to a mental hospital with a paralyzed hand. When asked why she did that, she replied "Because of everything". Despite her severe depression, she occasionally worked as an actress on the initiative of colleagues, now also on television. She re-used the alcohol excessively and called her friends at any time of the day or night to give long monologues. This went so far that her friends asked the telephone company to block their connection, whereupon they made their dreaded calls from telephone booths. A colleague later said, “That such a great person can sink so deep. One does not wish one's worst enemy that. ”On April 18, 1965, Easter Monday, she threw herself out of the window of her apartment and died shortly afterwards of the consequences. She is buried next to her husband Piet in the Zorgvlied cemetery in Amsterdam . The journalist Jan Willem Hofstra wrote after her death: "She had all the talents except to be happy."

memory

The Amsterdam Film Museum describes de la Mar as one of the few real Dutch divas .

In 1970 Wim Ibo shot the television documentary Namen die je nooit vergeet about Fien de la Mar with eyewitness accounts from her former colleagues. In 1972 her biography of Jenny Pisuisse was published, on the basis of which the musical Fien was created. The musical story revolves around the innumerable telephone monologues of Fien de la Mar in the last years of her life. It was shown on television in 1985 as a four-part series. In 2016 another documentary with the title Ik wil gelukkig zijn ( I want to be happy ) by Annette Apon was released .

A street in Amsterdam is named after her.

Filmography

  • 1933: Hollandsch Hollywood (short film)
  • 1934: The Bleeke Bet
  • 1934: The Three Sailors (De jantjes)
  • 1935: Op Stap
  • 1935: Het leven is niet zo kwaad
  • 1935: De Big van het regiment
  • 1936: Klokslag Twaalf
  • 1939: De Spooktrein
  • 1940: Ergens in Nederland

literature

Web links

Commons : Fien de la Mar  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b family De La Mar. In: joodsamsterdam.nl. September 27, 2019, accessed February 14, 2020 (Dutch).
  2. ^ Fien de la Mar: De vooroorlogse gloriejaren. In: eenlevenlangtheater.nl. July 22, 2002, accessed February 14, 2020 .
  3. ↑ a b c d Mar, Josephina Johanna de la (1898-1965). In: resources.huygens.knaw.nl. Retrieved February 14, 2020 .
  4. ^ Koen Kleijn: Striking Amsterdammers. Portraits of Amsterdammers die de stad kleur geven . ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  5. ↑ a b Fien de la Mar: Onder de vleugels van vader Nap de la Mar. In: eenlevenlangtheater.nl. July 22, 2002, accessed February 14, 2020 .
  6. ↑ Fien de la Mar: Liefdes. In: eenlevenlangtheater.nl. July 22, 2002, accessed February 14, 2020 .
  7. ↑ a b c d Fien de la Mar: Een own theater. In: eenlevenlangtheater.nl. July 22, 2002, accessed February 14, 2020 .
  8. ↑ Barbara Beuys : Life with the enemy. Amsterdam under German occupation . Hanser, 2012, ISBN 978-3-446-23996-8 , pp. 330 .
  9. ↑ De La Mar Theater. In: arcam.nl. Retrieved February 14, 2020 .
  10. ↑ Fien de la Mar liet laugh eighth with hair tragic. In: volkskrant.nl. March 17, 2016, accessed February 15, 2020 (Dutch).
  11. ↑ Fien de la Mar: De laatste jaren. In: eenlevenlangtheater.nl. July 22, 2002, accessed February 14, 2020 .
  12. ↑ Fien de la Mar. In: eyefilm.nl. April 26, 2016, accessed February 14, 2020 (Dutch).
  13. ↑ Fien de la Mar: Eerbetoon. In: eenlevenlangtheater.nl. July 22, 2002, accessed February 14, 2020 .
  14. ↑ Ik wil gelukkig zijn (2016). In: imdb.com. Retrieved February 15, 2020 .
  15. ↑ Fien de la Mar Straat in Amsterdam. In: postcode.site. Retrieved February 14, 2020 .
personal data
SURNAME Mar, Fien de la
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Mar, Josephina Johanna de la; Mar, Fientje de la
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Dutch actress and chanteuse
DATE OF BIRTH January 2, 1898
PLACE OF BIRTH Amsterdam
DATE OF DEATH April 23, 1965
Place of death Amsterdam