Udo Kier

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Udo Kier, 2011

Udo Kier (born Udo Kierspe on October 14, 1944 in Cologne-Lindenthal ) is a German actor and voice actor who has worked in over 250 film and television productions since the 1960s. He is one of the few German actors who also shoot in Hollywood . There he played alongside Nicole Kidman , Michael J. Fox , Keanu Reeves , River Phoenix , Wesley Snipes , Bruce Willis , Dolph Lundgren , John Malkovich , Matt Damon , Christoph Waltz and Arnold Schwarzenegger , among others .

Life

Udo Kier was born the illegitimate son of a seamstress in Cologne-Lindenthal . A few hours after he was born, he and his mother were buried in a hospital bombing raid, but the mother was able to rescue them both. Kier only got to know his biological father as an adult.

In his youth, Kier worked as an altar boy , prayer leader and chorus singer. He liked to dress up and put on make-up as a woman and, for example, imitated Caterina Valente . After school he began training as a wholesale salesman, and later he worked on the assembly line at Ford . He soon realized that he could also earn money with his appearance with delicate, girlish features, striking green eyes and curly brown hair. He worked temporarily as a model in the fashion industry. On a vacation trip to Cannes he met Jean Marais and Arndt von Bohlen and Halbach . According to his own admission, Kier is said to have let the latter endure for a while. At the age of 19 he came to London , where he made his way as a waiter. In the evening he attended drama school and got to know the director Luchino Visconti and the actor Helmut Berger , among others .

In the 1960s, Kier met the still unknown director and actor Rainer Werner Fassbinder . In 1964 he went to Rome , where he became a glamorous magazine celebrity. Back in England, Kier first played in a film at the age of 23 and then attended drama school in New York . In the course of time and with larger roles in film and television, he developed through his appearance, his eccentric expression and his courage to roles beyond the usual to the type of "curious stray through many weird worlds". In 1973 he achieved some fame in Paul Morrissey's films Frankenstein and Dracula . Kier kept his main residence in Cologne until the early 1990s, where he lived in an artists' colony with the painter Michael Buthe and the video artist Marcel Odenbach . He tried his hand at music in the 1980s, recording a record called The Eagle , which later featured in his first American film, My Private Idaho (1991), and traveling to Moscow with a rock-pop program.

Kier was also one of the bizarre activists of the cultural avant-garde from Mülheim an der Ruhr . In 1988 he starred in the film Mother's Mask, directed by Christoph Schlingensief, alongside Helge Schneider and Charly Weiss . The film was a surrealistic remake of the film sacrifice by Veit Harlan . Kier also played in a few Schlingensief films, in 1986 in Egomania - Island Without Hope by Tilda Swinton's side , 1989 in 100 Years of Adolf Hitler , 1990 in The German Chainsaw Massacre , 1992 in Terror 2000 , 1992 in Udo Kier - Death of a World Star (in which Kier plays himself), 1996 in United Trash and 1997 in Die 120 Tage von Bottrop .

Kier occasionally appeared in the theater and took on various roles in cinema and television films in many European countries. He played at the side of Hans Falár at the Bonner Schauspielhaus in The Short Life of Snow Clouds and together with Christine Kaufmann for a touring theater in Salome . After it had become a little quieter around him at times, he made the leap to Hollywood in 1991 and played a suitor in the film My Private Idaho by the American director Gus Van Sant . Through his appearance as a decadent flaneur in two pop videos and the scandal book SEX by the singer Madonna , film agencies became aware of him. He has now got numerous film and television roles in the US and also shot commercials. He was seen in the science fiction series seaQuest DSV by Steven Spielberg and in the movies Ace Ventura , The Legend of Pinocchio , The New Adventures of Pinocchio and Shadow of the Vampire . He gained greater prominence in the gamer scene through the role of the villain Yuri in the PC video game Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 and the add-on Yuri's Revenge .

He is also still in demand as an actor in Europe. He worked in particular with the Danish director Lars von Trier , for example in his films Epidemic , Medea , Europa , Hospital der Geister , Breaking the Waves , Dancer in the Dark , Dogville , Manderlay , Melancholia and Nymphomaniac . He also appeared occasionally in German films, for example as a killer in an episode of the crime series Rosa Roth or as a top gay terrorist and fashion designer in Hans-Christoph Blumenberg's Rotwang muss weg! from 1993. In American films he sometimes played very small roles. He was only seen in one scene in Josh and SAM . In 1995 he starred in the film Networked - Johnny Mnemonic and in 1998 in Michael Bay's Armageddon . From 2005 to 2007 Kier was seen in the children's mystery series 4 against Z as the dark magician Zanrelot ( anagram of "tolerance") who wants to usurp control over Lübeck . In it, he played with the young actress Carolyn McGregor . He also worked in the German film Jargo in 2004 .

In 2008 the PC game version of Far Cry was shot. In the work produced by Uwe Boll , Kier played the villain Dr. Krieger, as a counterpart to Jack Carver, played by Til Schweiger . In 2011 he starred in the Canadian drama-thriller Keyhole , which he and his film partner Isabella Rossellini presented on South by Southwest . He also starred alongside Brigitte Nielsen in the 2000 music video Make Me Bad by the US nu metal band Korn . Kier received the CineMerit Award 2014 for the documentary Arteholic (director: Hermann Vaske), which premiered at the Munich Film Festival . He was also seen in many installations and video clips by the band U2 as part of their Zoo TV tour (1992-1993). In 2008 Kier bought a former school building in Gehren , Thuringia , which he discovered while filming Lulu & Jimi .

In late June 2020, Kier became a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences .

Filmography (selection)

Synchronous roles

In addition, Kier was also active as a voice actor and lent himself the voice in the German synchronization of the following films:

Music videos

Documentaries - portraits

  • 2012: I - Udo ... starring Udo Kier , documentation, 43 min.

literature

  • Udo Kier: Footprints (photo book in limited edition of 600 copies), Cologne and New York 1991

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original dated November 24, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.zdf.de
  2. ^ Samuel Zimmerman: SXSW Feature Lineup announced. Fangoria, February 1, 2012, accessed May 28, 2013 .
  3. ↑ filmfest-muenchen.de: 06/30/14 - Udo Kier receives the CineMerit Award 2014. ( Memento of the original from July 14, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (accessed on June 11, 2014) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.filmfest-muenchen.de
  4. ↑ Markus Mähler: Are stones or roses waiting? Free Word , February 12, 2008, accessed May 28, 2013 .
  5. ^ Academy Invites 819 To Membership. In: oscars.org, June 30, 2020.
  6. ^ Announcement of the documentation by Hermann Vaske: Arteholic (accessed on July 11, 2014)
  7. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDsX9FV50vE
  8. ↑ trailer. YouTube , accessed May 28, 2013 .
personal data
SURNAME Kier, Udo
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kierspe, Udo
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German actor
DATE OF BIRTH October 14, 1944
PLACE OF BIRTH Cologne-Lindenthal , Germany