Phyllis Konstam

Phyllis Konstam and Henry Austin (1936)

Phyllis Konstam , born as: Phyllis Esther Kohnstamm (born April 14, 1907 in London , † August 20, 1976 in Somerset ) was an English actress. She starred in eleven films shot between 1928 and 1964, including four films directed by Alfred Hitchcock .

Life

In 1931 she married the English tennis star Henry Austin , whom she met on a cruise to the USA. She took this trip to take part in Frank Vosper's Murder on the Second Floor . Together with her husband, she was one of the idol couples of the time. The marriage had two children. Austin played tennis with Charlie Chaplin , was a friend of Daphne du Maurier and also met the wife of the English King Maria von Teck and President Franklin Roosevelt .

In her autobiography, which she wrote with her husband and which was called "mixed doubles" in reference to tennis, the spouses took turns writing the individual chapters of the almost three hundred page book.

In later years Konstam and her husband took part in charity events (film and theater productions) of the Oxford Group worldwide . Frank Buchman , the spiritual leader of this organization, occupies a large place in the memoirs of the couple. She herself is represented as "Phyllis Austin" together with her husband with 4 entries each in the biography of Frank Buchman.

References to Germany

Phyllis Konstam describes in the shared memoirs that, unlike her husband, she came from a Jewish family. She never met her German grandfather Konstam (note: Moritz Kohnstamm from Niederwerrn ). He had given up the original desire to become a rabbi because he did not want to accept all the teachings of the training. Instead, he would have become a school teacher and would have fed a family with little income. According to her father Alfred Konstam, the greatest pleasure as a child would have been to be given an orange once a month that was shared between the five siblings. Her father came to England with his second brother Rudolf at the age of 17 to work in the leather industry with cousin Hugo Konstam. His daughter was called Gertrude Kingston and was a well-known actress at the beginning of the 20th century. In her house on Victoria Square she ran a salon in which the literary and theater worlds of that time met. One of her closest friends was George Bernard Shaw , who wrote the drama The Great Catherine (1913) for her. Oscar, one of Phyllis Konstam's uncles and her father's eldest brother - Oskar Kohnstamm - was brilliant. During the First World War, his eldest son fell on the German side and the two oldest sons of their uncle Rudolf fell on the English side.

Filmography (selection)

• 1928: Champagne
• 1929: Blackmail ( Blackmail )
• 1930: murder - Sir John intervenes! ( Murder! )
• 1931: Up to the Knife ( The Skin Game )

literature

• Austin, HW; Konstam, Phyllis: A Mixed Double . London 1969

Web links

• Phyllis Konstam in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Photograph of the Austin couple together with Frank Buchman (3rd photo on the website)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Garth Lean: The Forgotten Factor. From the life and work of Frank Buchman . 1st edition. Brendow, Moers 1991, ISBN 978-3-87067-443-4 (480 pages).