Manja Behrens
Manja Behrens , married. Manja von Appen , (born April 12, 1914 in Dresden , † January 18, 2003 in Berlin ) was a German actress .
Life
Behrens, daughter of a lawyer and notary and the royal Saxon court actress Maria Lichtenegg , initially studied English in Prague, but had to end the course early due to financial worries in the family. She worked as a dental assistant until 1935 and, at the same time, from 1930 took private acting lessons with Waldemar Staegemann and later with Erich Ponto . In 1935 she made her debut as an actress at the Dresden State Theater in the play Und Pippa tanzt! where she became a sought-after actress overnight. "The way Ms. Behrens speaks, I would like to be spoken," said Gerhart Hauptmann after the theater premiere of the play.
From 1935 to 1953 she was engaged - with brief interruptions - at the Dresden State Theater, initially as a youthful lover and naive in tabloids , later increasingly in classical roles. With the help of Adolf Wohlbrück , an Austrian actor, Tobis offered Behrens a film contract for 2,000 Reichsmarks for Stronger Than Paragraphs , which appeared in 1936. This was followed by a better-paid contract for her second feature film Susanna im Bade and further feature film planning, whereby her two-year contract provided for fees of 12,000 and 18,000 Reichsmarks. After both roles, however, there was a break with Joseph Goebbels , who courted her, but was rejected by her. Behrens himself described the situation in the documentary series Hitler's Helpers as “a very unpleasant encounter with Mr. Goebbels” and continued: “Before I do something like that, I would rather scrub stairs. I may have been a little abusive and he said, 'I'll take you off the list of films with a red pen' ". She returned to the theater in Dresden. At a film ball in 1940 she met Martin Bormann , with whom she had an affair. This was tolerated by Bormann's wife. In the last year of the war, Behrens worked as a screwdriver in a factory.
After the end of World War II Behrens came into contemporary pieces in Dresden and in 1952 in the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm before 1953 at the Volksbühne Berlin changed where it until 1967, a commitment was. It was here that Behrens met her future husband, the set designer Karl von Appen , whom she married in 1958. Several DEFA film productions followed , such as Konrad Wolfs Sonnensucher in 1957 and Frank Beyer's Carbide and Sorrel in 1964 . She became a sought-after character actress.
In the mid-1960s, her love affair with Martin Bormann was discovered by the British historian Hugh Trevor-Roper , who examined Bormann's diaries and who could only identify Behrens, who appeared there as "M." The magazine Bunte reported extensively on this "secret" relationship in an issue. A film ban for almost 20 years followed.
The actress moved to the Maxim Gorki Theater in 1967 , where she was on stage for almost 25 years until the reunification. Despite the film ban, which was in place until around 1980, she occasionally took part in small film roles in television productions of the DFF . Since 1980, major film roles followed in GDR television films as well as in German television films. In addition, she also took on guest roles at the Burgtheater Vienna, the State Theater Bern and the Stadttheater Ingolstadt. “She is one of the actresses who are essential for German theater,” wrote Der Tagesspiegel on the occasion of her 85th birthday. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, she devoted herself to theater performances, among other things, to lecture tours.
After the death of her husband, she administered his estate and, among other things, preserved the model of the sutler's car from Brecht's mother Courage , which was pulled by Helene Weigel . Behrens died in Berlin in 2003 and was buried next to her husband in the Weißer Hirsch forest cemetery in Dresden.
Filmography
- 1936: Stronger than paragraphs
- 1936: Susanna in the bath
- 1957: Hunted until morning
- 1958: Sun Seeker (first performance 1972)
- 1959: Lorenz marriage case
- 1960: Seilergasse 8
- 1960: fair
- 1960: life begins
- 1960: The Neuberin (TV)
- 1961: murder without atonement
- 1963: Bonner Pitaval: The Heyde-Sawade Affair (TV series)
- 1963: Rime (TV)
- 1964: carbide and sorrel
- 1964: Great Money (TV)
- 1972: The Fall of the Prince of Arenberg (TV)
- 1974: Maria (TV)
- 1978: The Common Miracle (TV)
- 1980: Don't despair, ask Trudchen (TV)
- 1987: Excuse me - how do you get into my bed
- 1987: Stielke, Heinz, fifteen ...
- 1988: Polizeiruf 110 - The Man in the Tree (TV series)
- 1989: Wills (TV)
- 1990: Small but Charlotte (TV series)
- 1992: In the wake of fear (TV)
- 1992: Dead Flowers
- 1992: The big party (TV)
theatre
- 1935: Gerhart Hauptmann : And Pippa is dancing!
- 1943: Otto Erler : Die Blutsfreunde - Director: Rudolf Schröder ( Sächsische Staatstheater Dresden - Schauspielhaus)
- 1945: Friedrich Wolf : The last rehearsal - Director: Paul Lewitt
- 1947: Konstantin Simonow : The Russian Question (Jessy) - Director: Albert Fischel ( Staatstheater Dresden )
- 1947: Alexander Puschkin : The Stone Guest - Director: Albert Fischel (Staatstheater Dresden)
- 1949: Vercors : The Silence of the Sea - Director: Otto Dierichs (Staatstheater Dresden)
- 1952: Die Feinde ( Theater am Schiffbauerdamm )
- 1953: Gotthold Ephraim Lessing : Minna von Barnhelm (Minna) - Director: Carl Ballhaus (Staatstheater Dresden)
- 1954: Leo Tolstoy : Anna Karenina (Anna) - Director: Werner Stewe ( Volksbühne Berlin )
- 1955: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe : Götz von Berlichingen (Elisabeth) - Director: Fritz Wisten (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1956: Gerhart Hauptmann: Die Ratten (Mrs. John) - Director: Walther Suessenguth (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1957: Leo Tolstoy : The Power of Darkness (Anisja) - Director: Fritz Wisten (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1957: Tartuffe - Director: Rochus Gliese (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1958: The Dreyfus Affair - Director: Fritz Wisten (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1959: Johannes R. Becher : Winter Battle - Director: Lothar Bellag ( Berliner Ensemble )
- 1959: Friedrich Schiller Evening (Volksbühne Berlin - Theater on the 3rd floor)
- 1960: Gerhart Hauptmann: Fuhrmann Henschel (Hanne) - Director: Erich-Alexander Winds (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1961: Robert Adolf Stemmle / Erich Engel : Affair Blum (Frau Blum) - Director: Hagen Mueller-Stahl (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1961: Euripides : The Trojans (Athene) - Director: Fritz Wisten (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1962: do you know him? From the work of writing workers (Volksbühne Berlin - theater on the third floor)
- 1962: Oldřich Daněk : The Marriage of the Marriage Cheater - Director: Horst Drinda ( Deutsches Theater Berlin - Kammerspiele)
- 1963: Leo Tolstoy : War and Peace - Director: Wolfgang Heinz / Hannes Fischer (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1964: Coriolan
- 1965: Friedrich Dürrenmatt : The Old Lady's Visit (Claire Zachanassian) - Director: Fritz Bornemann (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1966: Max Frisch : Don Juan or The Love of Geometry (Celestina) - Director: Wolfram Krempel ( Maxim-Gorki-Theater Berlin)
- 1967: Georg Kaiser : Side by Side - Director: Wolf-Dieter Panse (Volksbühne Berlin)
- 1967: Maxim Vallentin : Wassa Shelesnowa - directed by Albert Hetterle (Maxim-Gorki-Theater Berlin)
- 1968: Luigi Pirandello : Liolà (Cruci Azzara) - Director: Hans Georg Simmgen (Maxim-Gorki-Theater Berlin)
- 1969: Michail Schatrow : Bolsheviks (Krupskaja) - Director: Fritz Bornemann (Maxim-Gorki-Theater Berlin)
- 1974: The Ordinary Miracle - directed by Wolfram Krempel (Maxim-Gorki-Theater Berlin)
- 1979: Ákos Kertész : Widows (mother) - Director: Karl Gassauer (Maxim-Gorki-Theater Berlin - Studio Theater)
- 1990: Alexander Galin : Retro or back on the roof (Former nurse Nina) - Director: Karl Gassauer (Maxim-Gorki-Theater Berlin - Studio Theater)
- 1992: Uncle Wanja (at the Academy Theater Vienna)
- 1994: The Father (at the City Theater Bern)
- 2000: Federico Garcia Lorca : Bernarda Albas Haus (Maxim-Gorki-Theater Berlin)
Awards
- 1974: Art Prize of the GDR
literature
- Frank-Burkhard Habel , Volker Wachter : The great lexicon of the GDR stars. The actors from film and television. Extended new edition. Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2002, ISBN 3-89602-391-8 .
- 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 , pp. 425f
- Aune Renk: Behrens, Manja . In: Who was who in the GDR? 5th edition. Volume 1. Ch. Links, Berlin 2010, ISBN 978-3-86153-561-4 .
Web links
- Manja Behrens in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Manja Behrens at filmportal.de
- Pictures by Manja Behrens In: Virtual History
- Manfred Altner: Manja Behrens (1913-2003) . In: Institute for Saxon History and Folklore (Ed.): Saxon Biography .
- Manja Behrens archive in the archive of the Academy of Arts, Berlin
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b On the death of the actress Manja Behrens [excerpts from a conversation with Lothar Ehrlich in July 1992]. In: Dresdner Latest News , January 24, 2003, p. 8.
- ↑ a b quot. after Hanns-Georg Rodek: Bormann's lover. The actress Manja Behrens loved Bormann and spoiled it with Goebbels . In: Die Welt , March 15, 2003, p. 29.
- ↑ Hanns-Georg Rodek: Bormann's beloved. The actress Manja Behrens loved Bormann and spoiled it with Goebbels . In: Die Welt , March 15, 2003, p. 29.
- ↑ Heinz Fiedler: Much gloss and a dark chapter . In: Sächsische Zeitung , September 6, 2013, p. 8.
- ↑ Never tired. For the 85th birthday of actress Manja Behrens. In: Der Tagesspiegel , April 11, 1999, p. 26.
- ↑ Irma Weinreich: "Obsessive Theater Animal". Actress Manja Behrens turns 85 . Swiss dispatch agency, April 5, 1999.
personal data | |
---|---|
SURNAME | Behrens, Manja |
ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Appen, Manja from (married name) |
BRIEF DESCRIPTION | German actress |
DATE OF BIRTH | April 12, 1914 |
PLACE OF BIRTH | Dresden |
DATE OF DEATH | January 18, 2003 |
Place of death | Berlin |