Kurt Gerron

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The comedian duo Siegfried Arno and Kurt Gerron at a culinary art exhibition in 1931
Walk of Fame of the cabaret in Mainz

Kurt Gerron (aka Kurt Gerson ) (born on May 11, 1897 in Berlin ; died on October 28, 1944 in the Auschwitz concentration camp ) was a German actor , singer and director . As a Jew, he was persecuted, interned and murdered by the National Socialists.

Life

Youth / participation in the First World War

Gerron was the only child of the wealthy Jewish businessman Max Gerson and his wife Toni geb. Giant. He was born in his parents' apartment at 4 Cuxhavener Strasse in Berlin's Hansaviertel . After successfully graduating from high school at the age of 17 , he wanted to study medicine, but instead had to go to the First World War as a front soldier . Due to a serious injury, he was unfit for combat and could now begin his studies, but this was shortened so that he could again be sent to war, this time as a hospital doctor.

The beginnings: theater, silent film, cabaret

Kurt Gerron as Brown in Threepenny Opera

After being wounded several times during his military service in World War I and later giving up his work as a doctor, he turned to acting in 1920. Without having had any special lessons, he made his debut in the little cabaret, where Trude Hesterberg discovered him. For the opening of the Wild Stage , Gerron was on the program alongside Bertolt Brecht , Joachim Ringelnatz and Walter Mehring . From 1920 to 1925 he was engaged, among others, at the Reinhardt Theaters in Berlin . He also appeared in revues and cabarets. The critic Pem characterized the cabaret artist in 1926 as follows:

“He shoots sentences. Whip the words. The rhythm carries you away, does not allow any resistance. He's got the rush, the speed on his neck. The verses fall mercilessly, scourge the time. Their weakness, their half-measures, their indifference. Not sentimental at all. Razor-sharp and ice-cold, it shows people in their smallness and brutality. You don't come to your senses. Subject to the verve of the attack. "

Since the early 1920s, Gerron was also seen in supporting roles in silent films. Due to his war injury, which resulted in a physiological illness, he suffered from increasing obesity. His massive and outwardly grotesque physical appearance contributed significantly to the fact that, to his chagrin, he was only cast for obscure or questionable characters.

From 1926 Gerron also directed, and from 1931 also established himself in talkies. He became famous for his performances and singing lectures in the Threepenny Opera by Bert Brecht and Kurt Weill, which premiered with sensational success in 1928 . He played the showman who performed " The Morality of Mackie Messer " and the role of the London police chief Tiger Brown .

Great success: the sound film

Gerron's greatest role was probably that of the magician Kiepert in Josef von Sternberg's The Blue Angel together with Marlene Dietrich (1930), and he also appeared in the film operetta Die Drei von der Gasstelle (1930), which was the breakthrough for the still unknown Heinz Rühmann Movie business meant. Gerron also received good reviews as a director of popular films such as It's getting better again with Heinz Rühmann or The White Demon with Hans Albers . After the National Socialists came to power, Gerron was forced to give up directing the UFA film Kind, I'm Looking Forward to Your Coming (1933). By 1933 he had acted in 60 films.

Flight and Exile

With his wife Olga geb. Meyer and his parents Max and Mally Gerron fled to Paris in 1933 after the National Socialist seizure of power , from there via Austria and Italy to Amsterdam . After the occupation of the Netherlands, Gerron played for a while at the Hollandsche Schouwburg , which was now called "Joodsche Schouwburg", until the entire ensemble was deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp .

In 1943 Gerron and his family were deported to the Westerbork transit camp in the Netherlands , and then also to Theresienstadt at the end of February 1944.

Gerron's friends Peter Lorre and Marlene Dietrich had tried to get him to Hollywood in time. But Gerron declined, probably because the German language was a necessary tool for him to work. Perhaps he was hoping for a change in Germany, like many of the Jews who did not emigrate further than the neighboring Netherlands.

Theresienstadt and Auschwitz

In Theresienstadt, an SS man recognized Gerron who had been shown in the Nazi propaganda film Der Ewige Jude through excerpts from his film roles as an example of an "inferior Jew" who had a negative influence on the German people through his films, and he beat him brutally confronts those unsuspectingly. Later Gerron acted on the stage of the ghetto cabaret "Karussell", which he founded.

In August 1944, the SS forced Gerron to direct the supposedly documentary film “ Theresienstadt ”. This film later became known under the title “The Führer gives the Jews a city”.

Some survivors blamed Gerron for his participation in this propaganda film, others, especially those whom he tried to save from deportation to Auschwitz by casting the film, showed understanding for his pseudo- collaboration . Gerron himself seems to have believed that only his theater and film skills and his willing participation in this film could save him from being murdered by the Nazis. After the film work was finished, Kurt Gerron and most of the prominent actors were transported to Auschwitz in October 1944 and gassed, including almost all of the children who appear in this film.

Filmography

As a performer

Silent films

Sound films

As a director

documentary

Continue to work

Viktor Rotthaler describes Gerron (next to Fritz Grünbaum ) as a Jewish artist to whom Dani Levy set a memorial in Mein Führer - The Really Truthful Truth about Adolf Hitler : Levy's imagination gives him a short reprieve. The tracksuit that Gerron wore in Theresienstadt is now worn by Hitler himself. It will be Gerron who will confirm Grünbaum ... that the Sachsenhausen camp was dissolved as requested by Grünbaum. At gunpoint he will be forced into this last great lie of his life.

On September 4th, 2014 Gerron was honored with a star on the Boulevard der Stars in Berlin.

literature

  • Barbara Felsmann, Karl Prümm : Kurt Gerron - celebrated and hunted. 1897-1944. The fate of a German entertainer. Berlin, Amsterdam, Theresienstadt, Auschwitz (= contributions to theater, film and television from the Institute for Theater Studies at the Free University of Berlin. Vol. 7 = Series German Past. No. 63). Edition Hentrich, Berlin 1992, ISBN 3-89468-027-X .
  • Ulrich Liebe: adored, persecuted, forgotten. Actor as a Nazi victim. Beltz Quadriga, Weinheim u. a. 1992, ISBN 3-88679-197-1 .
  • Roy Kift : Camp Comedy. A play featuring original cabaret songs from Gerron's Karussell cabaret, and dealing with Gerron's moral dilemma in making the propaganda film for Goebbels. In: Robert Skloot (Ed.): The theater of the Holocaust. Volume 2: Six plays. University of Wisconsin Press, Madison WI u. a. 1999, ISBN 0-299-16274-5 , German translation available from the author (further information: available online ).
  • Katja B. Zaich: “An emigrant would appear very undesirable to us.” K. G. as a film director, actor and cabaret artist in the Netherlands. In: Claus-Dieter Krohn , Lutz Winckler, Irmtrud Wojak , Wulf Koepke (eds.): Film and photography (= exile research. An international yearbook. Vol. 21). Edition Text and Criticism, München 2003, ISBN 3-88377-746-3 , pp. 112–128.
  • Charles Lewinsky : Gerron. Novel. Nagel & Kimche, Zurich 2011, ISBN 978-3-312-00478-2 .
  • Kay Less : “In life, more is taken from you than given….” Lexicon of filmmakers who emigrated from Germany and Austria 1933 to 1945. A general overview. ACABUS-Verlag, Hamburg 2011, ISBN 978-3-86282-049-8 , pp. 185-188.

Web links

Commons : Kurt Gerron  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ IMDb and filmportal.de name October 28th as the day of death, Adolf Heinzlmeier and Berndt Schulz: Lexicon of German film and TV stars October 15th, Ulrich Liebe (Ed.): From Adorf to Ziemann. The bibliography of the actor biographies 1900–2000 October 30, Kay Less: The large personal dictionary of the film "Late October".
  2. ^ Birth certificate StA Berlin XIIa No. 1173/1897 .
  3. ↑ Paul Marcus (d. I. Pem ): Die vom Brettl . In: Der Junggeselle , No. 23, June 2, 1926, p. 6.
  4. ↑ ghetto-theresienstadt.de
  5. ↑ Erwin Leiser : "Germany, awake!" Propaganda in the film of the Third Reich . Rowohlt Verlag, Reinbek near Hamburg 1968, ISBN 3-499-10783-X , p. 76 f.
  6. ↑ Kurt Gerron's carousel. In: filmportal.de . German Film Institute , accessed April 1, 2016 .
personal data
SURNAME Gerron, Kurt
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Gerson, Kurt
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German actor and director
DATE OF BIRTH May 11, 1897
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH October 28, 1944
Place of death Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp