Friedrich Holthaus

"The actor Friedrich Holthaus";
Portrait drawing by August Heitmüller , around 1919

Friedrich Holthaus (born July 29, 1847 in Osnabrück , † November 18, 1928 in Hanover ) was a German teacher , actor , opera singer and heroic tenor . The “old master of German drama” was successful in some almost forgotten plays by Ernst von Wildenbruch , but also in classical roles, for example in plays by Shakespeare , Goethe and Schiller .

Life

Friedrich Holthaus was born at the time of the Kingdom of Hanover and the beginning of industrialization in the Osnabrücker Johannisstraße 114 as the son of a factory worker and Catharina Regina , née Evening . The six-year-old boy got to know the Osnabrück City Theater through his mother while attending a performance of Halévy's opera La Juive . The youngster also had contact with the Osnabrück theater scene later. However, Friedrich Holthaus initially chose a pre-established, secure civil career as a teacher in Bremen . As such, he experienced a performance of the play Kabale und Liebe by Friedrich Schiller , which - according to his own memories - finally gave him the decisive impetus to give in to his acting vocation:

"One day I took heart and poured my whole soul in a letter to the character player at the time, Ludwig Ulbrich ."

Ulbrich advised Holthaus to get used to the Hanoverian pronunciation of the "st" and to take dance and fencing lessons - and finally accepted him as a student. In 1867 Holthaus received his first - unpaid - engagement "[...] in the summer theater in the Berggarten zu Celle " until his teacher, who had meanwhile become theater director in Augsburg , also brought him to the southern German city. Holthaus stayed there for around three years, playing "[...] Kraut und Rüben" and sang in around twenty operas . After a guest appearance in Hanover in the role of Narcissus in 1871, when the German Empire was founded, Hans Bronsart von Schellendorf engaged him for the Hanoverian court theater . In the same year Holthaus was a founding member of the German Theater Members' Cooperative . A quarter century played Holthaus now in Hanover, from there reported critics to "this strong personality, especially [...] the hearts of the youth willingly go [gave]." That between, he has performed at Heinrich Laube at Vienna's Theater and 1881 in Munich .

In the meantime, Holthaus had joined the Hanover Art Association in 1874 .

After his engagement in Hanover, where he was made an honorary member of the court theater when he left and Carl Friedrich Peppler was his successor, Holthaus joined the Dresden Court Theater Association in the spring of 1895 . Around three years later he moved to Berlin , where he played the hero tenor and appeared on the stages of the Schiller Theater , the New Theater and most recently at the Deutsches Theater under Max Reinhardt .

In 1910 Friedrich Holthaus ended his acting career. In 1914 he returned to Hanover and gave acting lessons there. Theo Lingen became one of his students .

After the death of his wife, Friedrich Holthaus felt lonely. The German hyperinflation had made him impoverished. He was left with only a modest pension until his death. Posthumously , the cooperative received an award for his commitment to younger artists and their upheavals in the two previous decades through the yearbook of the Deutsche Bühnengenossenschaft .

More students

• Alwine Wiecke (1869-), German actress

Commemoration

• While Holthaus was still alive, the Mayor of Osnabrück, Erich Gaertner , proposed the name of today's Friedrich-Holthaus-Strasse for a new building area at a “morning party” organized for Holthaus in the Osnabrück City Theater .
• The honorary grave for the court actor can be found at the Engesohde city cemetery in Hanover in Department 23 E, grave number 37

Archival material

• The Frank Wedekind collection in the Hanover City Library contains a manuscript without a year from Holthaus to an unknown person on September 6th
• The collection of manuscripts and old prints in the Otto Rub estate in the Austrian National Library contains a two-page letter from Holthaus dated January 4, 1879
• The Berlin State Library - Prussian Cultural Heritage owns numerous theater tickets (ornamented flyers) from 1900 onwards for the comedy Die goldene Eva from the Schiller Theater in Berlin with the actors and their roles, including Holthaus as Count Zeck
• The Hanover Historical Museum has two studio photos taken by the photographer Carl Michelmann from around 1880 with Holthaus dressed as King Johann and Mephisto from Goethe's Faust

See also

• List of members of the Hannoversche Künstlerverein

Literature (selection)

• Georg Asso Peters: court actor Friedrich Holthaus. On his 90th birthday on July 29, 1937. In: Land und Menschen , supplement to the Osnabrücker Tageblatt of January 30 and February 13, 1960
• August Heitmüller : Hanoverian heads from administration, business, art and literature (drawing), Volume 1, Osterwald, Hanover 1929.
• Ilsetraut Lindemann: Friedrich Holthaus , in this: City history in street names , Osnabrück: self-published by the author, circa 1972; online on the website of the Chronos Cultural Association ( Associazione Culturale Chronos a Roma )
• Deutsches Theater-Lexikon , Vol. 1, p. 837
• Brigitta Weber (Ed.), Carsten Niemann , Ludwig Hoerner (Vorw.): Auf Wiedersehn hier u. "there". Stage artist in early photographs (= Prinzenstrasse , issue 3), 1st edition, accompanying document to the special exhibition In the Photo Atelier from November 13, 1994 to January 15, 1995 in the Kurt-Söhnlein-Raum of the Theatermuseum Hannover, publisher: Theatermuseum und -archiv der Niedersächsischen Staatstheater, Hannover, Hannover: Revonnah-Verlag, 1994, ISBN 3-927715-43-3 , passim ; Preview over google books
• Rudolf Vierhaus (Ed.): Supplements / register of persons , in ders .: Deutsche Biographische Enzyklopädie , 2nd, revised and expanded edition, vol. 11, Munich: KG Saur, 2008, p. 493; online through google books

Web links

Commons : Friedrich Holthaus  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} Franz Rudolf Zankl : The actor Friedrich Holthaus in the roles of King Johann (left) and Mephisto (right). Photograph by Carl Michelmann. Around 1880 , in ders. (Ed.): Hannover Archive , Volume 8 (1986), Sheet K 18
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i} Ilsetraut Lindemann: Friedrich Holthaus , in this: City history in street names , Osnabrück: self-published by the author, circa 1972; online  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
3. ^ Hugo Thielen: Holthaus, Friedrich. In: Klaus Mlynek, Waldemar R. Röhrbein (eds.) U. a .: City Lexicon Hanover . From the beginning to the present. Schlütersche, Hannover 2009, ISBN 978-3-89993-662-9 , p. 306.
4. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i} Hugo Thielen : Holthaus, Friedrich. In: Hannoversches Biographisches Lexikon , p. 177; online through google books
5. ^ Eduard Noack: Court theater memories. Selection of outstanding theater performances and concerts from around 13,000 total performances of the Royal Theater of Hanover for the 50th anniversary published and provided with numerous historical notes , Hanover: Schaper, 1902, p. 74; limited preview in Google Book search
6. ↑ Ingrid Bigler-Marschall (Ed.): Wiecke, Alwine (born Halberstadt). In: Deutsches Theater-Lexikon , Vol. VI, p. 3316; online through google books
7. ↑ Karin von Schwartzenberg (responsible), Stephanus Fischer (text): Graves of honor in the cemeteries of the state capital Hanover (leaflet), publisher: State capital Hanover - The Lord Mayor, Department of Environment and Urban Greenery - Department of Urban Cemeteries - Department of Administration and Customer Service, Hanover: 2010, PDF download from hannover.de
8. ↑ Compare the information from the Kalliope network
9. ↑ Compare the information provided by SBB
10. ↑ For the ownership of the photographs, see the information in the table of contents from the Hannover Archive