Ilka Grüning

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Ilka Grüning in 1898
Ilka Grüning (around 1900)

Ilka Grüning , wrongly also Ilka Grünning, actually Ilka Henriette Grünzweig (born September 4, 1876 in Vienna , † November 11, 1964 in Los Angeles ) was an Austrian actress .

Life

Ilka Grüning appeared at the age of 17 as an apprentice in the Berlin Residenz Theater and immediately had success in the title role of August Strindberg's Fraulein Julie . This was followed by an engagement at the Schillertheater in 1894, followed by appearances at the Belle Alliance Theater , Lessing Theater , Neue Theater and in 1896 in Bremen .

Grüning played Juliet in Romeo and Juliet , Amalie in The Robbers and Queen Anna in Eugène Scribes The Glass of Water . Soon she was also a popular silent film actress, mostly as a salon lady or in mother roles. Her preferred profession were sophisticated literary adaptations and period films. In addition, she ran her own drama school together with Lucie Höflich in Berlin in the 1920s , which Lilli Palmer , Brigitte Horney and, in 1928, Inge Meysel also attended.

After Hitler came to power , she limited herself to teaching in the following years, left Germany in 1938 for France and emigrated to the USA in early February 1939. With other emigrant colleagues, she worked on several anti-Nazi films. In the classic film Casablanca she played the immigrant Ms. Leuchtag at Ludwig Stössel's side , who gave her first English skills to the bartender Carl ( Szöke Szakall ).

After the war, Ilka Grüning returned to Europe on a tour in 1950, where she also visited Germany. In the winter of 1952/53 she stood in front of the camera for the last time in a feature film for the Swiss production Die Venus vom Tivoli . Subsequently, in 1953, Ilka Grüning returned to the USA, where she spent the last years of her life. She was buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in Santa Monica .

Filmography (selection)

literature

Web links

Commons : Ilka Grüning  - Collection of Images

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ludwig Eisenberg : Large biographical lexicon of the German stage in the 19th century . List, Leipzig 1903, p. 362

Remarks

  1. ↑ According to exil-archiv.de 1868, according to IMDb 1878. On this, Kay Less in Das große Personenlexikon des Films : "Ilka Grüning died in November 1964 at the age of 88 and not, as is often stated, at the age of 86 or even 96" . Her date of birth September 4, 1876 is also confirmed according to US tax records and her California death certificate. According to Ludwig Eisenberg's theater dictionary, however, the date of birth is December 4, 1878. It is also written there in Grünning .
personal data
SURNAME Grüning, Ilka
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Grünning, Ilka (misspelling); Grünzweig, Ilka Henriette (full name at birth)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian actress
DATE OF BIRTH 4th September 1876
PLACE OF BIRTH Vienna
DATE OF DEATH November 11, 1964
Place of death Los Angeles , California , United States