Maria Andergast

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Maria Andergast
Photography by Alexander Schmoll .

Maria Andergast (born June 4, 1912 as Maria Pitzer in Brunnthal , municipality of Wald an der Alz , † February 14, 1995 in Vienna ) was a German-Austrian actress and singer.

Life

Maria Andergast lost her parents at the age of two, grew up with relatives in Vienna and took their names. She took dance lessons with Grete Wiesenthal , but had to break it off after a serious traffic accident and instead took acting lessons with Josef Danegger at the Academy for Music and Performing Arts Vienna . She had her first stage engagement in 1928 in the Bohemian town of Aussig , after which she worked at the German State Theater in Prague and at the Theater in der Josefstadt in Vienna.

In 1932 Maria Andergast was discovered for the screen by Luis Trenker , but had to cancel the role he offered her in the film The Rebel due to scheduling reasons. The collaboration with Trenker did not come about until 1933, after which she was immediately given the opportunity to play other leading roles. Her trademarks were sweet, simple, solid types of girls who, despite a certain tendency towards melancholy, are ready to fight for their happiness in life. Maria Andergast's popularity did not detract from the fact that this happiness in life was mostly of a very conventional kind and that the possibilities of action of these female characters were often limited to the option of heroic renunciation. In Trenker's masterpiece The Prodigal Son (1933/34), she embodied the bride who loyally waits in the mountain home for her childhood friend who has been driven by wanderlust abroad. In her second film, The Adventures of a Young Gentleman in Poland (1934), she played a Russian countess who had to give up her love for an Austrian officer (played by Gustav Fröhlich ) under the political conditions of the First World War . Other film lovers were Wolf Albach-Retty , Viktor de Kowa and Albrecht Schoenhals . In addition, the actress often appeared alongside Viennese character actors such as Leo Slezak , Hans Moser and Paul Hörbiger .

In 1936 Maria Andergast married the director Heinz Helbig , who used her as the leading actress in three of his films, and went with him to Berlin, where she continued to work at the theater. From 1939 on she lived and worked mainly in Vienna, but as a stage actress also made guest tours to Rome, Warsaw, Switzerland and Sweden. During the Second World War she took part in two Nazi propaganda films ( Spähtrupp Hallgarten , Sechs Tage Heimaturlaub , both 1941), but for the first time also received an offer for an artistically interesting film role: in EW Emo's folk song, Der liebe Augustin (1941) - a film who was also committed to National Socialism , - as a friend of the bailiff, she was allowed to show a somewhat larger section of her acting capabilities.

Burial place of Maria Andergast

After the end of the Second World War, Maria Andergast played at the Theater in der Josefstadt and at the Munich Residenztheater . Another comparatively interesting film role followed in 1946, when Maria Andergast portrayed the slandered wife of a war returnees ( Rudolf Prack ) in the first Austrian post-war film “Der weite Weg” (1946) . The hit Mariandl composed by Hans Lang , which she sang in her next film in 1947 - Der Hofrat Geiger - was the starting point for Maria Andergast's second career as a singer. The hit song Du bist die Rose vom Wörthersee , composed by Hans Lang in 1950 , was also sung by her. Since the mid-1950s, however, she only appeared in supporting roles in the film. After suffering serious injuries in a car accident in 1966, she took a career break of several years. Since the 1960s, Maria Andergast was occasionally seen in television productions. In 1972 she moved from Munich to Vienna and finally withdrew into private life. In the following year she was awarded the Silver Badge of Honor of the State of Vienna. In 1995 she died of cancer. Parts of her estate are in the Filmmuseum Potsdam .

Maria Andergast was married three times: with the director Heinz Helbig (since 1936; divorced), the actor Siegfried Breuer (since 1941; divorced) and the actor and director Richard Häussler (1958–1964; until his death). She was engaged to the director Franz Antel , who directed five of her films from 1950 onwards, for a long time in 1949 and then was in a relationship with the (married) composer Hans Lang for seven years.

It rests in an honorary grave in the Vienna Central Cemetery (Gr. 4, R. 35, No. 2). In 1996 the Maria-Andergast-Weg in Vienna- Donaustadt (22nd district) was named after her.

Filmography

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Hilli Reschl in Rupert Leutgeb, Wolfgang Tauscher: Hans Lang - Melodies go around the world. Zwettl 2008, ISBN 978-3-901287-13-8 , p. 298
personal data
SURNAME Other guest, Maria
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Pitzer, Maria (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-Austrian actress and singer
DATE OF BIRTH June 4, 1912
PLACE OF BIRTH Brunnthal , municipality of Wald an der Alz
DATE OF DEATH February 14, 1995
Place of death Vienna