Franz Wenzler

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Franz Wenzler (born April 26, 1893 in Braunschweig , † January 9, 1942 in Rome ) was a German theater actor , theater director and film director .

Work at the theater

After graduating from high school, Wenzler went to the theater in his hometown as a trainee at the age of 19. There he first worked as an actor. This was followed by stops in Regensburg , Bad Elster , again Braunschweig and Munich , where he appeared at the Münchner Kammerspiele . In 1915 he was drafted briefly. He then moved to the Deutsches Theater Berlin , where he was seen under Max Reinhardt's artistic directorship or direction in 1916/17 as Valentin in Goethe's Faust , as Güldenstern in Shakespeare's Hamlet and as Mercier in Georg Büchner's Dantons Tod .

Wenzler also began working as a director early on. Coming from the Thalia Theater Hamburg , he made his directorial debut at Berlin's Neuer Freier Volksbühne under Friedrich Kayssler at the end of 1918 . From the beginning of the 1920s he directed the Berlin Tribüne and the Zurich Schauspielhaus (the so-called Pfauenbühne, 1921–1926), to which he engaged Peter Lorre in 1925/26 and with whom he performed expressionist pieces. From 1926 to 1931 Wenzler worked at the Wiener Kammerspiele , of which he was also the owner from 1931. On February 14, 1928, he directed "Die Sister" by Hans Kaltneker with Maria Orska , Friedl Haerlin , Edwin Juergensen, Willy Hendrichs, Theodor Grieg and Peter Lorre.

Film work

Franz Wenzler returned to Berlin in 1931 and began directing films. Until the end of 1932 he shot almost without exception simple comedies, pranks and comedies, with Gipfelstürmer also a mountaineering film in the tradition of Arnold Fanck . Franz Wenzler achieved dubious fame in 1933 with his work Hans Westmar , which tried to glorify the life and death of the notorious Nazi thug and SA storm leader Horst Wessel and to stylize him as a martyr of the Nazi movement.

Despite this vigorous attempt to ingratiate himself with the new rulers, Wenzler did not find approval with his poorly staged work; the film lacked too much of technical quality. He was forbidden to name the film (as originally planned) "Horst Wessel". The NSDAP -member Wenzler tried to rehabilitate it and staged, after a presentation of the year Benito Mussolini , the historicist Napoleon -Stoff Hundred Days at its screenplay (along with Karl Vollmöller as co-author). It was to be his last feature film.

Conflict with the Nazi regime

In 1935, Wenzler finally fell out of favor. He received no directing offers, in September 1936 he was expelled from the Reichsfilmkammer because, as it was called, “proven unreliability”. It is alleged that he was irresponsible with the money made available for the Nazi film project People Without Space .

Wenzler then returned to the theater (Vienna's Kammerspiele) and stayed in the Austrian capital until April 1938. Franz Wenzler's application to be re-accepted into the Reichsfilmkammer in 1941 in order to be able to work as a film director again was rejected. A little later, at the beginning of 1942, Wenzler, who had meanwhile found an exile in Rome, died under unexplained circumstances.

Films (as a director)

  • 1931: The Disgust (co-director)
  • 1931: The night without a break (co-director)
  • 1931: Ehe mbH
  • 1932: Scandal in Parkstrasse (also co-producer)
  • 1932: love, joke and seriousness
  • 1932: When love makes fashion
  • 1932: summiteer
  • 1933: Everyone participates (short documentary and Nazi advertising film)
  • 1933: Hans Westmar
  • 1934: The steel beam
  • 1934: Hundred Days (also script collaboration)
  • 1935: People without space (Nazi documentary film)

literature

  • Hervé Dumont: "Das Zürcher Schauspielhaus from 1921 to 1938", pp. 10–17, 104–106, Editions Publi SA, Lausanne 1973
  • Fabian Tietke: Co-produced contradictions. The German-Italian period films Campo di maggio, Hundert Tage and Condottieri. In: Francesco Bono, Johannes Roschlau (ed.): Tenors, tourists, guest workers. German-Italian film relations. Munich, edition text + kritik, pp. 57–68.
  • Kay Less : Between the stage and the barracks. Lexicon of persecuted theater, film and music artists from 1933 to 1945 . With a foreword by Paul Spiegel . Metropol, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-938690-10-9 , p. 434.
  • Kay Less: 'In life, more is taken from you than given ...'. Lexicon of filmmakers who emigrated from Germany and Austria between 1933 and 1945. A general overview. ACABUS-Verlag, Hamburg 2011, ISBN 978-3-86282-049-8 , p. 656 f.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Life data according to the article Franz Wenzler in Kay Less : Between the stage and the barrack . Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-938690-10-9 , pp. 434 f., And Franz Wenzler at filmportal.de . In the literature, an unspecified Hochberg in Württemberg is also given as the place of birth, which is sometimes based on Wenzler's own misstatements (e.g. in the Reichsfilmkammer files). Both Vienna's population register and Braunschweig's birth register confirm the above date and place of birth. Wenzler's date of death can be read on his tombstone in Rome
personal data
SURNAME Wenzler, Franz
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German director
DATE OF BIRTH April 26, 1893
PLACE OF BIRTH Braunschweig
DATE OF DEATH January 9, 1942
Place of death Rome