Georg John

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Georg John , born in Georg Jacobsohn (born July 23, 1879 in Schmiegel near Posen , † November 18, 1941 in the Litzmannstadt ghetto ), was a German actor .

Life

John began his theater career around 1900 on traveling and smear stages . In 1904 he became an actor and director in Wilhelmshaven , and from 1905 he worked in Stolp , Altona , Mülheim an der Ruhr , Bochum and Göttingen . In 1914 he received an engagement as an actor and director at the Vaterländische Schauspiele in Vienna .

Since 1917 he was a frequently cast silent film actor. His first appearances in Die Fremde as a bearded Tibetan monk and as Death in Hilde Warren and Death were characteristic of his subsequent appearance, even if he was seen in the roles of fathers, husbands and notables, especially at the beginning.

Typical of him, however, were representations of bizarre, gnome-like figures in several classics of German silent films. In Fritz Lang's Der müde Tod (1921) he played a beggar, in Die Nibelungen (1924) he played three roles, in M (1931) he played the blind balloon seller who recognizes the murderer because of a whistled song. Also Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau put him repeatedly, including as the compassionate night watchman in The Last Man (1924).

Classified by the National Socialists as a so-called “ full Jew ”, Georg Jacobsohn / John was immediately excluded from the German cultural scene after they came to power in 1933 and since spring 1933 has not been offered any film roles. He then joined the Kulturbund Deutscher Juden under his maiden name - Jews had meanwhile been banned from using artist names - and took part in its performances until the dissolution of this Jewish institution on September 11, 1941 (last appearance in Franz Molnar's play in the castle ) . Occasionally, as in 1937 with the Hirschfeld-Franzos play Der Pojaz , he also directed. Immediately following the closure of the Jewish Cultural Association, German authorities deported him to the Litzmannstadt ghetto , where John, in poor health, died soon after under unexplained circumstances.

Filmography

literature

  • 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. 193.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME John, Georg
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Jacobsohn, Georg (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German actor
DATE OF BIRTH July 23, 1879
PLACE OF BIRTH Schmiegel at Posen
DATE OF DEATH November 18, 1941
Place of death Lodz ghetto