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"Wir wollen niemals auseinandergeh'n,
wir wollen immer zueinandersteh'n.
Mag auf der grossen Welt auch noch soviel gescheh'n,
wir wollen niemals auseinandergeh'n.
Uns're Welt bleibt so schön,
wir wollen niemals auseinandergeh'n."
Dieser Refrain des Schlagers von Heidi Brühl aus den Sechzigerjahren, ist mir sofort in den Sinn gekommen, als ich die zwei zusammengewachsenen Sonnenblumen sah.
Sie gehören wirklich zusammen!
Einen wunderschönen Sommertag wünsche ich euch allen!
German postcard by Krüger, nr. 902/322. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was the German participant at the Eurovision Song Contest.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
German postcard by Krüger, nr. 903/321. The photo is made by the master of the pin-up pics, Bernard of Hollywood.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was the German participant at the Eurovision Song Contest.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
German postcard by Krüger.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was a German participant in the Eurovision Song Contest.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards
Dutch postcard by P. Moorlang, Heerlen, Sort. 16/6.
German actress and media personality Birgit Bergen (1938) is well known in her homecountry for her performances in several sexfilms and as a 'Schickerialady' at Munich Events.
Birgit Bergen was born in 1938 in Kiel. She was the daughter of a bailiff. From 1958 on she appeared in films and on tv - mostly in secondary roles. Among her first films were Nackt, wie Gott sie schuf/Naked Like God Created Her (1958, Hans Schott-Schöbinger) featuring Marisa Allasio, Lass mich am Sonntag nicht allein/Don’t Leave me Alone On Sunday (1959, Arthur Maria Rabenalt) with Heidi Brühl, and Lebensborn/Ordered to Love (1961, Werner Klingler) starring Maria Perschy. Bergen also appeared in international productions like the adventure film Maciste contro i mostri/Colossus of the Stone Age (1962, Guido Malatesta) as a nude blonde, or Les saintes nitouches/Wild Living (1963, Pierre Montazel) in an uncredited part. In Germany she played small parts in the comedy Bei Pichler stimmt die Kasse nicht/Pichler's Books Are Not in Order (1961, Hans Quest) with Theo Lingen, and in one of the many Edgar Wallace crime films of the 1960’s, Der Würger vom Tower/Strangler of the Tower (1966, Hans Mehringer) featuring Ellen Schwiers. On tv she appeared briefly as a street prostitute in an episode of the popular krimi series Der Kommissar (1969) starring Erik Ode.
In the early 1970’s, Birgit Bergen became very busy during the sex wave of the German cinema. She often appeared as the good-time girl or the unfaithful wife in Lederhosefilms (rural sex comedies) with such titles as Laß jucken, Kumpel! (1972, Franz Marischka), Liebesgrüße aus der Lederhose (1973, Jürgen Enz) and Junge Mädchen mögen's heiß, Hausfrauen noch heißer (1973, Eberhard Schröder). She also appeared in sex crap like Eine Armee Gretchen/She Devils of the SS (1973, Erwin C. Dietrich). Later she played in non-sex films like Johnny West (1977, Roald Koller). Her last film role was a small part in the action film Brass Target (1978, John Hough), starring Sophia Loren. In 1991 she made a guest appearance on the tv series Ehen vor Gericht/Marriage in Court. Since then Birgit Bergen stays regularly fodder for the boulevard press because of her facefifts or because of her dubious friendships. As a media personality she is often a guest at marketing events in Munich.
Source: Wikipedia, and IMDb.
Dutch postcard by Gebr. Spanjersberg, Rotterdam, no. 6017. Photo: Fontana / Phonogram. Singers Ria Valk and Heidi Brühl during a promotional visit of the latter in the Netherlands.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was a German participant in the Eurovision Song Contest.
Heidi Rosemarie Brühl was born in Gräfeling near München (Munich), Germany in 1942. After the divorce of her parents, she grew up with her grandparents. She made her first film when she was only 12. Director Harald Braun had discovered her in a ballet class and cast her for an uncredited bit part in Der letzte Sommer/The Last Summer (Harald Braun, 1954) starring heartthrob Hardy Krüger. This was followed by a small part in the Heimat film Heideschulmeister Uwe Karsten/Eternal Love (Hans Deppe, 1954) featuring Claus Holm. A string of these silly romantic rural films made her a teen idol. Her most popular films were a trilogy based on novels by children's writer Ursula Bruns about the pony farm Immenhof: Die Mädels vom Immenhof/The Girls of Immenhof (Wolfgang Schleif, 1955) with Angelika Meisner and Christiane König as her orphaned sisters, Hochzeit auf Immenhof/Marriage at Immenhof (Volker von Collande, 1956) and Ferien auf Immenhof/Holiday at Immenhof (Hermann Leitner, 1958).
Heidi Brühl also appeared in the excellent Thomas Mann adaptation Die Bekenntnisse des Hochstaplers Felix Krull/Confessions of Felix Krull (Kurt Hoffmann, 1957) with another German teen idol of the 1950s, Horst Buchholz. That years, she also starred in Die Frühreifen/The Prematures (Josef von Baky, 1957) with another cute boy Christian Wolff. She also appeared opposite Wolff in Verbrechen nach Schulschluss/The Young Go Wild (Alfred Vohrer, 1959). Heidi Brühl then could be seen as a singer in the Schlager-film Schlager-Raketen/Hit-Rockets (Erik Ode, 1960). She also starred in Freddy und die Melodie der Nacht/Freddy and the Melody of the Night (Wolfgang Schleif, 1960) featuring schlager star Freddy Quinn, and the operetta film Der Zigeuner Baron/The Gypsy Baron (Kurt Wilhelm, 1962) opposite Carlos Thompson.
At the age of 16, Heidi Brühl decided to go back to school and studied singing, dancing, acting, English, and French. In 1959 she formed a Schlager duo, the Dolly Sisters together with Corina Corten. They obtained a record deal with the Philips label, and their first record 'Chico Chico Charlie' reached the no. 5 position in the German hit parade. In 1960 she wanted to enter the Eurovision Song Contest solo with 'Wir wollen niemals auseinandergehn' (We will never part), but she finished in second place. The song became her biggest hit though. It reached no. 1 in the German single charts, stayed there for nine weeks, and sold more than a million copies. The song was a cover of Doris Day's 'Ring of Gold', and she was nicknamed the 'Doris Day of Germany'. She participated again at the German pre-selection in 1963, and this time she was successful and joined the Eurovision Song Contest in London. She became 9th with the song 'Marcel'. Till 1967 she had 12 hits in Germany. She did not make films in Germany during this period, but she appeared on stage in musicals like 'Annie Get Your Gun' (1964) and 'My Fair Lady'(1969). That year she also published the memoir 'Eine kühle Blonde bitte. Erinnerungen eines bisweilen unvorsichtigen Mädchens' (A cool blonde, please. Recollections of a sometimes careless girl) (1969).
When Heidi Brühl was on a concert tour in the US she was asked to play Princess Jana opposite Guy Williams in MGM's Captain Sindbad (Byron Haskin, 1963), but the movie flopped. Brühl met American actor Brett Halsey and moved with him to Rome, where they married in December 1964. She did not make any films while she lived in Rome. In the 1970s the family moved to the US, where she acted in the deadly dull comedy How to Seduce a Woman (Charles Martin, 1974) and appeared opposite Clint Eastwood in a small part in the adventure film The Eiger Sanction (Clint Eastwood, 1975). She also worked for TV and was a guest star in such popular crime series as Columbo (1973) starring Peter Falk, Get Christie Love! (1974-1975) starring Teresa Graves, and Marcus Welby, M.D. (1976) with James Brolin. In Las Vegas, she performed together with Sammy Davis Jr. In between she returned to Germany to play in two further Immenhof sequels, Zwillinge vom Immenhof/Twins from Immen Farm (Wolfgang Schleif, 1973) with Horst Janson, and Frühling auf Immenhof/Spring at Immen Farm (Wolfgang Schleif, 1974) with Olga Tschechova. Both were flops. In 1976 she divorced Halsey and returned to Germany. There she worked mainly for TV, such as in the Krimi series as Der Alte/The Old Fox (1985) starring Michael Ande, and Ein Fall für zwei/A Case for Two (1984, 1987) with Claus Theo Gärtner. She also did dubbing work on films such as The Never Ending Story and Look Who's Talking Too, and in 1982 she started a recording studio. Her final film appearance was as a civil servant in the immigration drama Kleiner Mann was tun/Little man What To Do (Uschi Madeisky, Klaus Werner, 1981). When she was 20, Heidi Brühl had been diagnosed with stomach cancer but had defeated the disease. In the late 1980s she got breast cancer but this time she had to surrender and refused chemotherapy. Heidi Brühl passed away in 1991 in Starnberg, Germany, at only 49 years old. She had two children. Her son Clayton Halsey (1967) is an editor and actor, and her daughter Nicole Brühl-Halsey (1970) is an actress.
Sources: Stephanie D'heil (Steffi-line) (German), Filmportal.de, Prisma (German) Wikipedia (German), and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Dutch postcard by NS, no. 62119. Heidi Brühl in Madurodam. Collection: Marlene Pilaete.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was a German participant in the Eurovision Song Contest.
Heidi Rosemarie Brühl was born in Gräfeling near München (Munich), Germany in 1942. After the divorce of her parents, she grew up with her grandparents. She made her first film when she was only 12. Director Harald Braun had discovered her in a ballet class and cast her for an uncredited bit part in Der letzte Sommer/The Last Summer (Harald Braun, 1954) starring heartthrob Hardy Krüger. This was followed by a small part in the Heimat film Heideschulmeister Uwe Karsten/Eternal Love (Hans Deppe, 1954) featuring Claus Holm. A string of these silly romantic rural films made her a teen idol. Her most popular films were a trilogy based on novels by children's writer Ursula Bruns about the pony farm Immenhof: Die Mädels vom Immenhof/The Girls of Immenhof (Wolfgang Schleif, 1955) with Angelika Meisner and Christiane König as her orphaned sisters, Hochzeit auf Immenhof/Marriage at Immenhof (Volker von Collande, 1956) and Ferien auf Immenhof/Holiday at Immenhof (Hermann Leitner, 1958).
Heidi Brühl also appeared in the excellent Thomas Mann adaptation Die Bekenntnisse des Hochstaplers Felix Krull/Confessions of Felix Krull (Kurt Hoffmann, 1957) with another German teen idol of the 1950s, Horst Buchholz. That year, she also starred in Die Frühreifen/The Premature (Josef von Baky, 1957) with another cute boy Christian Wolff. She also appeared opposite Wolff in Verbrechen nach Schulschluss/The Young Go Wild (Alfred Vohrer, 1959). Heidi Brühl then could be seen as a singer in the Schlager-film Schlager-Raketen/Hit-Rockets (Erik Ode, 1960). She also starred in Freddy und die Melodie der Nacht/Freddy and the Melody of the Night (Wolfgang Schleif, 1960) featuring schlager star Freddy Quinn, and the operetta film Der Zigeuner Baron/The Gypsy Baron (Kurt Wilhelm, 1962) opposite Carlos Thompson.
At the age of 16, Heidi Brühl decided to go back to school and studied singing, dancing, acting, English, and French. In 1959 she formed a Schlager duo, the Dolly Sisters together with Corina Corten. They obtained a record deal with the Philips label, and their first record 'Chico Chico Charlie' reached the no. 5 position in the German hit parade. In 1960 she wanted to enter the Eurovision Song Contest solo with 'Wir wollen niemals auseinandergehn' (We will never part), but she finished in second place. The song became her biggest hit though. It reached no. 1 in the German single charts, stayed there for nine weeks, and sold more than a million copies. The song was a cover of Doris Day's 'Ring of Gold', and she was nicknamed the 'Doris Day of Germany'. She participated again at the German pre-selection in 1963, and this time she was successful and joined the Eurovision Song Contest in London. She became 9th with the song 'Marcel'. Till 1967 she had 12 hits in Germany. She did not make films in Germany during this period, but she appeared on stage in musicals like 'Annie Get Your Gun' (1964) and 'My Fair Lady'(1969). That year she also published the memoir 'Eine kühle Blonde bitte. Erinnerungen eines bisweilen unvorsichtigen Mädchens' (A cool blonde, please. Recollections of a sometimes careless girl) (1969).
When Heidi Brühl was on a concert tour in the US she was asked to play Princess Jana opposite Guy Williams in MGM's Captain Sindbad (Byron Haskin, 1963), but the movie flopped. Brühl met American actor Brett Halsey and moved with him to Rome, where they married in December 1964. She did not make any films while she lived in Rome. In the 1970s the family moved to the US, where she acted in the deadly dull comedy How to Seduce a Woman (Charles Martin, 1974) and appeared opposite Clint Eastwood in a small part in the adventure film The Eiger Sanction (Clint Eastwood, 1975). She also worked for TV and was a guest star in such popular crime series as Columbo (1973) starring Peter Falk, Get Christie Love! (1974-1975) starring Teresa Graves, and Marcus Welby, M.D. (1976) with James Brolin. In Las Vegas, she performed together with Sammy Davis Jr. In between she returned to Germany to play in two further Immenhof sequels, Zwillinge vom Immenhof/Twins from Immen Farm (Wolfgang Schleif, 1973) with Horst Janson, and Frühling auf Immenhof/Spring at Immen Farm (Wolfgang Schleif, 1974) with Olga Tschechova. Both were flops. In 1976 she divorced Halsey and returned to Germany. There she worked mainly for TV, such as in the Krimi series Der Alte/The Old Fox (1985) starring Michael Ande, and Ein Fall für zwei/A Case for Two (1984, 1987) with Claus Theo Gärtner. She also did dubbing work on films such as The Never Ending Story and Look Who's Talking Too, and in 1982 she started a recording studio. Her final film appearance was as a civil servant in the immigration drama Kleiner Mann was tun/Little Man What To Do (Uschi Madeisky, Klaus Werner, 1981). When she was 20, Heidi Brühl had been diagnosed with stomach cancer but had defeated the disease. In the late 1980s she got breast cancer but this time she had to surrender and refused chemotherapy. Heidi Brühl passed away in 1991 in Starnberg, Germany, at only 49 years old. She had two children. Her son Clayton Halsey (1967) is an editor and actor, and her daughter Nicole Brühl-Halsey (1970) is an actress.
Sources: Stephanie D'heil (Steffi-line) (German), Filmportal.de, Prisma (German) Wikipedia (German), and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
German postcard by Krüger, nr. 902/319. Postcard: Bernard of Hollywood.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was the German participant at the Eurovision Song Contest.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
German postcard by Krüger, no. 902/323. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942 - 1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was the German participant at the Eurovision Song Contest.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
German postcard by Krüger, nr. 900/78. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.
Bernard of Hollywood is the nom de plume of German born glamour photographer Bruno Bernard Sommerfeld (1912–1987). In Hollywood he photographed most of the big stars of Hollywood during the 1940's and 1950's, but he is now best known for his pin-up photography. His artistic muse was the late, legendary striptease artist Lili St. Cyr. Bernard went on to photograph strippers, Vegas showgirls; unknown, poignantly unnamed models; to all the starlets of the 1950's and 1960's. In 1961 he sold his studios and returned to Europe. For the German postcard publisher Krüger he started to photograph European film actresses and models. Among them were Heidi Brühl, Maria Perschy and voluptuous Barbara Valentin, aka the German Jayne Mansfield. Bernard of Hollywood also photographed the original, when Jayne Mansfield was working in Europe after her Hollywood career had dried up.
For more Krüger postcards with pin-up photos by Bernard of Hollywood check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
German postcard by Krüger, nr. 900/78. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.
Bernard of Hollywood is the nom de plume of German born glamour photographer Bruno Bernard Sommerfeld (1912–1987). In Hollywood he photographed most of the big stars of Hollywood during the 1940's and 1950's, but he is now best known for his pin-up photography. His artistic muse was the late, legendary striptease artist Lili St. Cyr. Bernard went on to photograph strippers, Vegas showgirls; unknown, poignantly unnamed models; to all the starlets of the 1950's and 1960's. In 1961 he sold his studios and returned to Europe. For the German postcard publisher Krüger he started to photograph European film actresses and models. Among them were Heidi Brühl, Maria Perschy and voluptuous Barbara Valentin, aka the German Jayne Mansfield. Bernard of Hollywood also photographed the original, when Jayne Mansfield was working in Europe after her Hollywood career had dried up.
For more Krüger postcards with pin-up photos by Bernard of Hollywood check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
German postcard by Krüger, no. 902/330. Photo: Bernard of Hollywood.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was the German participant at the Eurovision Song Contest.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards Already over 3 million views! Or follow us at Tumblr or Pinterest.
Dutch postcard by P. Moorlag, Heerlen, Sort. 10/6.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was the Doris Day of Germany.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Cover photo of Guy Williams, Heidi Bruhl, Abraham Sofaer and Bernie Hamilton. Interior art by Russ Manning. Along with JACK THE GIANT KILLER and THE MAGIC SWORD, this was one of the best 1960s fantasy/adventures that wasn't a Harryhausen film.
German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, no. F 154.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was the German participant at the Eurovision Song Contest.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards Already over 3 million views! Or follow us at Tumblr or Pinterest.
German postcard by Philips.
Austrian singer and actor Willy Hagara (1927-2015) was a popular film and TV star from the mid 1950s till the mid 1960s. The discrete and elegant Schlager star had five Top 10 hits, including the evergreen 'Casetta in Canada' (1958). The singer’s career did not survive the Beat wave, but in 1969 an inheritance made him a millionaire.
Wilhelm ‘Willy’ Hagara was born in Vienna, Austria in 1927. He was initially trained as a postal clerk and practiced this profession as well. In 1946, he won a popular song contest in the Wiener Konzerthaus. He focused all his activities to this new career, and took singing and acting lessons. During this time he was successful with folk songs and as the singer of the band of John Fehring, who later became the leader of the ORF Big Band Orchestra. Hagara was a classic band singer who performed one of his songs in an early Schlager show for the German ARD television, Schlager-Expreß/Schlager Express (1953). Finally in 1955 came his breakthrough with the song Eine Kutsche voller Mädels/A coach full of girls (1955). Willy Hagara moved to Frankfurt in Germany and he became something like the German Perry Como, whose songs in German versions he often would sing. Two years later he appeared in his first film, the musical comedy Weißer Holunder/White Elder (Paul May, 1957) with Germaine Damar. It was followed by a string of light entertainment films: Liebe, Mädchen und Soldaten/Love, girls and soldiers (Franz Antel, 1958), Mein ganzes Herz ist voll Musik/My whole heart is filled with music (Helmut Weiss, 1959), Der Haustyrann/The domestic tyrant (Hans Deppe, 1959) starring Heinz Erhardt, Laß mich am Sonntag nicht allein/Let me not be alone on Sunday (Arthur Maria Rabenalt, 1959) with Heidi Brühl, and Paprika/Pepper (Kurt Wilhelm, 1959).
Cinema attendance in Germany and Austria had spectacularly grown in the 1950s, but at the end of the decade it first stagnated and then went into freefall in the 1960s. The once so popular Schlager films became outdated. In 1961 Willy Hagara appeared in his last Schlager film, Ramona (Paul Martin, 1961) with Senta Berger. At the time, television was developing into a mass medium that could compete with the cinema. In 1962 there were already 7 million TV sets in West-Germany. Hagara moved over to the small screen and appeared in such musical TV comedies as Mitternachtszauber/Midnight Magic (Ralph Lotar, 1964) with Werner Fuetterer, and Vom Ersten das Beste/From the first the best (Ekkehard Böhmer, 1965) with Hannelore Auer. These TV productions were in the same genre as the films he had made in the 1950s for the cinema. Until the mid-1960s he starred in numerous TV films and sold many records. In total he had five Top 10 hits, including the evergreen Casetta in Canada. His song Du spielst 'ne tolle Rolle (You play a great role) became in the version of Nat King Cole a Top 10 hit in the US. But the Beat wave finished his singing career. His later TV-films included Ein Mädchen von heute/A girl of today (Dieter Finnern, 1966) with Karin Baal. In 1969 he got a million inheritance: his father, the merchant Franz Hagara, left him with a villa and several lease lands in Vienna. He did not retire, but he bridged the 1970s with performances during galas. Incidentally he appeared as a guest in such TV shows as Hit-Journal (H.B. Theopold, 1973), Tango-Tango (Horst Eppinger, 1976) and Ein kleines Glück auf allen Wegen/A small fortune on all routes (Ekkehard Böhmer, 1980). After the death of his wife in 1986, Willy Hagara retired from show business. His last public appearance was in a show from Schloss Schönbrunn in Vienna in 2002 on the occasion of his 75th birthday. Willy Hagara passed away in 2015 in Wiesbaden, Germany. He was 87.
Sources: Wälz Studer (Memoryradio.de) (German), Wikipedia (English and German), and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
besser bekannt als Gut Immenhof
Die Mädels vom Immenhof ist die Verfilmung des Buches Dick und Dalli und die Ponies von Ursula Bruns Mitte der 50 Jahre mit u.a. Heidi Brühl als Dalli.
German postcard by F.J. Rüdel, Filmpostkartenverlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf, no. 704.
Blond, handsome actor Helmuth Schneider (1920 - 1972) appeared in more than 50 films and also worked as an assistant director. He worked in Germany, but also in Latin America, Italy and France.
Helmuth (often Helmut) Schneider was born in Munich, Germany in 1920. Her studied medicine in Munich in 1938, and attended the drama school of the Deutsches Theater in Berlin. In 1942 he made his stage debut in the comedy Sophienlund. He had to quit his engagement at the Deutsches Theater for the war effort. He was wounded in France. Schneider made his film debut for the UFA with a small part in the musical drama Träumerei/Daydream (1944, Harald Braun) about the love story of Clara Wieck Schumann (Hilde Krahl) and Robert Schumann (Mathias Wieman). In 1946, he left Germany and stayed in Latin America where he worked in the film business under the name Alexandre Carlos. In 1952, he was back in Germany and and played at the Deutsches Theater in Göttingen. In the cinema, he co-starred with Edith Mill in the romantic drama Zwei Menschen/Two People (1952, Paul May). It made both stars of the heimat film. The following years he was the handsome hunter or forrester in several forgettable German rural romances, such as Der Fischer vom Heiligensee, Drei Birken auf der Heide (1956) and Jägerblut (1957). In 1959, he starred as Kara Ben Nemsi in the Karl May adventure Der Löwe von Babylon/The Lion of Babylon (1959, Johannes Kai, Ramón Torrado) with Georg Thomalla and Theo Lingen.
In the 1960’s, when the German film industry experienced a downturn, Helmuth Schneider worked for television, such as for the crime series Stahlnetz (1960-1963), the German version of Dragnet. He moved to Rome, which was the new centre of the European cinema. He had a supporting part in the adventure film Captain Sindbad (1963, Byron Haskin) starring Guy Williams and Heidi Brühl, and the war film The Secret Invasion (1964, Roger Corman) with Stewart Granger and Raf Vallone. In France he appeared as an unsympathetic Nazi officer in war dramas like Le facteur s'en va-t-en guerre/The Postman Goes to War (1966, Claude Bernard-Aubert) starring Charles Aznavour, and Paris brûle-t-il?/Is Paris Burning? (1966, René Clément) starring Jean-Paul Belmondo and Charles Boyer. He played such a role also in the war comedy La grande vadrouille/Don't Look Now, We've Been Shot At (1966, Gérard Oury) with Bourvil and Louis de Funès. He also had a part in the fifth and final episode of the Angélique series with Michèle Mercier, Angélique et le sultan/Angélique and the Sultan (1967, Bernard Borderie). In Italy he made a spaghetti western, Ciakmull - L'uomo della vendetta/The Unholy Four (1970, Enzo Barboni) Hal Erickson at AllMovie: “It's one of those spaghetti westerns in which the heroes and heavies are virtually indistinguishable. Though the outlaw leader (played by George Eastman credited by his birth name Luigi Montefiore) is evil incarnate, he isn't much worse than the four mercenaries hunting him down. Stalwart John Ford-regular Woody Strode is given plenty of screen time, and he makes the most of it. Director Enzo Barboni was billed as E. B. Clucher in the American prints.”Schneider also played in another war film Gott mit uns/The Fifth Day of Peace (1970, Giuliano Montaldo) starring Franco Nero. His final film was À la guerre comme à la guerre/War is war (1972, Bernard Borderie), a historical war comedy starring Leonard Whiting and Curd Jürgens. Helmuth Schneider died in a traffic accident in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 1972. He was 51.
Sources: Hal Erickson (AllMovie), Peter Hoffmann (Biografie.de) (German), Tom B. (Westerns…all Italiana). Wikipedia (German) and IMDb.
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H., Minden/Westf. Photo: Deutsche Cosmopol Film (DCF). Elke Arendt and Willy Hagara in Paprika (Kurt Wilhelm, 1959).
Austrian singer and actor Willy Hagara (1927-2015) was a popular film and TV star from the mid-1950s till the mid-1960s. The discrete and elegant Schlager star had five Top 10 hits, including the evergreen 'Casetta in Canada' (1958). The singer’s career did not survive the Beat wave, but in 1969 an inheritance made him a millionaire.
Wilhelm ‘Willy’ Hagara was born in Vienna, Austria in 1927. He was initially trained as a postal clerk and practised this profession as well. In 1946, he won a popular song contest in the Wiener Konzerthaus. He focused all his activities on this new career and took singing and acting lessons. During this time he was successful with folk songs and as the singer of the band of John Fehring, who later became the leader of the ORF Big Band Orchestra. Hagara was a classic band singer who performed one of his songs in an early Schlager show for the German ARD television, Schlager-Expreß/Schlager Express (1953). Finally in 1955 came his breakthrough with the song Eine Kutsche voller Mädels/A coach full of girls (1955). Willy Hagara moved to Frankfurt in Germany and he became something like the German Perry Como, whose songs in German versions he often would sing. Two years later he appeared in his first film, the musical comedy Weißer Holunder/White Elder (Paul May, 1957) with Germaine Damar. It was followed by a string of light entertainment films: Liebe, Mädchen und Soldaten/Love, Girls and Soldiers (Franz Antel, 1958), Mein ganzes Herz ist voll Musik/My whole heart is filled with music (Helmut Weiss, 1959), Der Haustyrann/The domestic tyrant (Hans Deppe, 1959) starring Heinz Erhardt, Laß mich am Sonntag nicht allein/Let me not be alone on Sunday (Arthur Maria Rabenalt, 1959) with Heidi Brühl, and Paprika/Pepper (Kurt Wilhelm, 1959).
Cinema attendance in Germany and Austria had spectacularly grown in the 1950s, but at the end of the decade, it first stagnated and then went into freefall in the 1960s. The once so-popular Schlager films became outdated. In 1961 Willy Hagara appeared in his last Schlager film, Ramona (Paul Martin, 1961) with Senta Berger. At the time, television was developing into a mass medium that could compete with the cinema. In 1962 there were already 7 million TV sets in West Germany. Hagara moved over to the small screen and appeared in such musical TV comedies as Mitternachtszauber/Midnight Magic (Ralph Lotar, 1964) with Werner Fuetterer, and Vom Ersten das Beste/From the first the best (Ekkehard Böhmer, 1965) with Hannelore Auer. These TV productions were in the same genre as the films he had made in the 1950s for the cinema. Until the mid-1960s he starred in numerous TV films and sold many records. In total, he had five Top 10 hits, including the evergreen Casetta in Canada. His song Du spielst 'ne tolle Rolle (You Play a Great Role) became in the version of Nat King Cole a Top 10 hit in the US. But the Beat Wave finished his singing career. His later TV films included Ein Mädchen von heute/A Girl of Today (Dieter Finnern, 1966) with Karin Baal. In 1969 he got a million inheritance: his father, the merchant Franz Hagara, left him with a villa and several lease lands in Vienna. He did not retire, but he bridged the 1970s with performances during galas. Incidentally, he appeared as a guest in such TV shows as Hit-Journal (H.B. Theopold, 1973), Tango-Tango (Horst Eppinger, 1976) and Ein kleines Glück auf allen Wegen/A small fortune on all routes (Ekkehard Böhmer, 1980). After the death of his wife in 1986, Willy Hagara retired from show business. His last public appearance was in a show from Schloss Schönbrunn in Vienna in 2002 on the occasion of his 75th birthday. Willy Hagara passed away in 2015 in Wiesbaden, Germany. He was 87.
Sources: Wälz Studer (Memoryradio.de) (German), Wikipedia (English and German), and IMDb.
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German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, no. F 110. Photo: Bayer.
Austrian singer and actor Willy Hagara (1927-2015) was a popular film and TV star from the mid 1950s till the mid 1960s. The discrete and elegant Schlager star had five Top 10 hits, including the evergreen 'Casetta in Canada' (1958). The singer’s career did not survive the Beat wave, but in 1969 an inheritance made him a millionaire.
Wilhelm ‘Willy’ Hagara was born in Vienna, Austria in 1927. He was initially trained as a postal clerk and practiced this profession as well. In 1946, he won a popular song contest in the Wiener Konzerthaus. He focused all his activities to this new career, and took singing and acting lessons. During this time he was successful with folk songs and as the singer of the band of John Fehring, who later became the leader of the ORF Big Band Orchestra. Hagara was a classic band singer who performed one of his songs in an early Schlager show for the German ARD television, Schlager-Expreß/Schlager Express (1953). Finally in 1955 came his breakthrough with the song Eine Kutsche voller Mädels/A coach full of girls (1955). Willy Hagara moved to Frankfurt in Germany and he became something like the German Perry Como, whose songs in German versions he often would sing. Two years later he appeared in his first film, the musical comedy Weißer Holunder/White Elder (Paul May, 1957) with Germaine Damar. It was followed by a string of light entertainment films: Liebe, Mädchen und Soldaten/Love, girls and soldiers (Franz Antel, 1958), Mein ganzes Herz ist voll Musik/My whole heart is filled with music (Helmut Weiss, 1959), Der Haustyrann/The domestic tyrant (Hans Deppe, 1959) starring Heinz Erhardt, Laß mich am Sonntag nicht allein/Let me not be alone on Sunday (Arthur Maria Rabenalt, 1959) with Heidi Brühl, and Paprika/Pepper (Kurt Wilhelm, 1959).
Cinema attendance in Germany and Austria had spectacularly grown in the 1950s, but at the end of the decade it first stagnated and then went into freefall in the 1960s. The once so popular Schlager films became outdated. In 1961 Willy Hagara appeared in his last Schlager film, Ramona (Paul Martin, 1961) with Senta Berger. At the time, television was developing into a mass medium that could compete with the cinema. In 1962 there were already 7 million TV sets in West-Germany. Hagara moved over to the small screen and appeared in such musical TV comedies as Mitternachtszauber/Midnight Magic (Ralph Lotar, 1964) with Werner Fuetterer, and Vom Ersten das Beste/From the first the best (Ekkehard Böhmer, 1965) with Hannelore Auer. These TV productions were in the same genre as the films he had made in the 1950s for the cinema. Until the mid-1960s he starred in numerous TV films and sold many records. In total he had five Top 10 hits, including the evergreen Casetta in Canada. His song Du spielst 'ne tolle Rolle (You play a great role) became in the version of Nat King Cole a Top 10 hit in the US. But the Beat wave finished his singing career. His later TV-films included Ein Mädchen von heute/A girl of today (Dieter Finnern, 1966) with Karin Baal. In 1969 he got a million inheritance: his father, the merchant Franz Hagara, left him with a villa and several lease lands in Vienna. He did not retire, but he bridged the 1970s with performances during galas. Incidentally he appeared as a guest in such TV shows as Hit-Journal (H.B. Theopold, 1973), Tango-Tango (Horst Eppinger, 1976) and Ein kleines Glück auf allen Wegen/A small fortune on all routes (Ekkehard Böhmer, 1980). After the death of his wife in 1986, Willy Hagara retired from show business. His last public appearance was in a show from Schloss Schönbrunn in Vienna in 2002 on the occasion of his 75th birthday. Willy Hagara passed away in 2015 in Wiesbaden, Germany. He was 87.
Sources: Wälz Studer (Memoryradio.de) (German), Wikipedia (English and German), and IMDb.
And, please check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Dutch postcard by N.V. v.h. Weenenk & Snel, Baarn, no. 761. Photo: Gofilex. Heidi Brühl in Immer will ich dich gehören/Always I will be yours (Arno Assmann, 1960) with Peter Weck.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was the German participant at the Eurovision Song Contest.
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Dutch postcard by Gofilex film, nr. 376. Still from Immer will ich dir gehören (1960, Arno Assmann).
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was the Doris Day of Germany.
Heidi Brühl made her first film when she was only 12. Director Harald Braun discovered her in a ballet class and casted her for his Der letzte Sommer (1954). A string of silly Heimat-films made her a teen idol. Her most popular films were the trilogy about the pony farm Immenhof: Die Mädels vom Immenhof (1955, Wolfgang Schleif), Hochzeit auf Immenhof (1956, Volker von Collande) and Ferien auf Immenhof (1958, Hermann Leitner). At age 16, she decided to go back to school and studied singing, dancing, acting, English and French. In 1959 she formed the Dolly Sisters together with Corina Corten. Their song Chico Chico Charlie reached the no. 5 position in the German hitparade. In 1960 she wanted to enter the Eurovision Song Contest solo with Wir wollen niemals auseinandergehn, but she lost the preselection. The song became her biggest hit though and reached no. 1 in the German single charts.Three years later she could as yet join the Eurovision Song Contest and became 9th with the song Marcel. Till 1967 she had 12 hits in Germany.
When Heidi Brühl was on a concert tour in the US she was asked to play Princess Jana opposite Guy Williams in MGM's Captain Sindbad (1963, Byron Haskin), but the movie flopped. In 1964 she moved to Rome, but did not make any films there. In Italy she met her future husband, the American actor Brett Halsey. In the 1970’s they moved to the US, where she acted in The Eiger Sanction (1975, Clint Eastwood). She also worked for tv and performed in Las Vegas together with Sammy Davis jr. In 1976 she divorced Halsey and returned to Germany. She played in two bad sequels to the Immenhof films, worked for tv and also started a record studio. When she was 20, she had been diagnosed with stomach cancer, but defeated the disease. In the late 1980’s she got breath cancer and died, only 49 years old. She had two children. Her son Clayton Halsey (1967) is an editor and actor.
Sources: IMDb, Steffi-line.de, Filmportal.de and Wikipedia.
German postcard by WS-Druck, Wanne-Eickel, nr. 199. Photo: Ringpress/Vogelmann/NDF.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was the Doris Day of Germany.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
Dutch postcard by NS, no. 12.
Legendary Belgian singer-songwriter Jacques Brel (1929-1978) was one of the most important and influential representatives of the French chanson. At the height of his success, in 1966, he chose to stop singing to devote himself to theatre and cinema. Brel has sold over 25 million records worldwide. There have been at least 400 recorded versions of his song, Ne me quitte pas/ If You Go Away, in over 15 different languages by performers like Marlene Dietrich, Rod McKuen, Nana Mouskouri, Nina Simone and Sting. Terry Jacks' version of Le Moribond , Seasons in the Sun became a global pop hit in 1974. Brel’s boundless enthusiasm toward life, his inexhaustible energy and his respect for ordinary people remain unforgettable.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was the German participant at the Eurovision Song Contest.
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German postcard by ISV, nr. H 76, circa 1964.
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German postcard by Universum-Film Aktiengesellschaft (Ufa), Berlin-Tempelhof, no. Ck 417. Photo: Millowitsch Theater.
Willy Millowitsch (1909-1999) was a popular German stage and TV actor and the director of the Volkstheater Millowitsch in Cologne. From 1949 on, he appeared in many West-German and Austrian films.
Willy Millowitsch was born in Cologne in the Rhineland region in Germany, in 1909. His parents were Peter and Käthe Millowitsch and came from a long family tradition of engagement with the theatre which can be traced back to 1792. It was not until 1895 however, that Millowitsch's grandfather stopped using puppets and resorted to real actors instead. Millowitsch was interested in theatre at an early age, and took to the stage for the first time in 1922 at just 13. According to IMDb, he had intended to become an engineer, but he quit school without a degree to pursue his acting career full-time. At first, he worked under the auspices of his father who had to give up his theatre after the inflation hit. This forced them to go on tour in and around Cologne until they got a permanent theatre in 1936, the now famous Volkstheater Millowitsch, which Willy took over from his father in 1940. In 1933, he had his first film appearances in two short film comedies, So leben wir alle Tage/That’s how we always live (Hasso Preiß, 1933) and Wenn Männer kochen/When men cook (Hasso Preiß, 1933). In 1939 he married his first wife Lini Lüttgen, but they got divorced soon after. During World War II, the theatre was damaged, but not severely, and by October 1945 it was fully restored, owing to the support of mayor and later German chancellor, Konrad Adenauer, who proclaimed that the people need something to laugh about again. Consequently, in the time from 1945 to 1949 there were daily performances in the theatre. It was during this time that he met his second wife, Gerda Millowitsch, formerly Feldhoff. They remained married till his death.
In 1949, when the post-war theatre euphoria died down, Willy Millowitsch focused on his film and television career. In 1949 he played a supporting part in the West-German crime film Gesucht wird Majora/Search for Majora (Hermann Pfeiffer, 1949) starring Lotte Koch. Next, he appeared in the drama Madonna in Ketten/Madonna in Chains (Gerhard Lamprecht, 1949), starring Lotte Koch, Karin Hardt and Elisabeth Flickenschildt. He also appeared in one of the last Harry Piel adventure films, Der Tiger Akbar/Tiger’s Claw (Harry Piel, 1951). Many more films were to follow. He did not content himself just transferring from one medium to the other, but brought the theatre with him. In 1953 the Kölsch (Cologne dialect) play Der Etappenhase (The stage hare) was broadcast on the TV channel WDR, the first live broadcast of a theatrical performance with real audience in German television history. Despite bitter criticism of the entry of low 'folk culture' into television by the director of the NDR channel, Adolf Grimme, it was an instant success. This remains one of Millowitsch's most popular plays and has been performed more than 1,000 times. Der Etappenhase was so popular that just six weeks later it was broadcast again, live from the Volkstheater. In 1957, it was made into a film, Der Etappenhase (Wolfgang Becker, 1957), but with Beppo Brem in the leading role and Millowitsch in a supporting part. Millowitsch continued to put on television plays that were instant successes, gaining national popularity. It is in great part Millowitsch's achievement to have popularised Kölsch throughout Germany. People were now associating the Rhinelander with a relaxed lifestyle and genial humour. Theatres from other dialectal areas scrambled to catch up with him and soon the dialect theatre became an important part of the German television landscape. With the success of these plays on television, interest in theatre gradually increased and by the 1960s flocks of people took to the theatre again to witness performance of Millowitsch's popular plays first hand. Until the beginning of the 1960s Millowitsch had to rent out his theatre now and again, but with the arrival of the new crowds Millowitsch could afford to concentrate his career on theatre from then on. He renovated the theatre in 1967 and the Volkstheater once again became a focal point of local culture, and many young dialect artists started their careers there.
In the early 1960s, Willy Millowitsch had also moved on from supporting to starring parts in films. He was the title figure in the West German comedy Der wahre Jakob/The True Jacob (Rudolf Schündler, 1960) and his co-stars were Renate Ewert and Jane Tilden. The film was a remake of the popular German comedy Der wahre Jakob/True Jacob (Hans Steihoff, 1931), starring Ralph Arthur Roberts. Next Millowitsch starred in Willy, der Privatdetektiv/Willy the Private Detective (Rudolf Schündler, 1960) with Renate Mannhardt and Rudolf Platte, Der Hochtourist/The high-season tourist (Ulrich Erfurth, 1961) with Claude Farell, and Robert und Bertram/Robert und Bertram (Hans Deppe, 1961) opposite Vico Torriani and Trude Herr. The latter comedy was inspired by the characters in Gustav Raeder's 1856 play Robert and Bertram, updated to the modern era. Two vagabonds, Robert and Bertram, are hired by a shoe company to walk 500 kilometres to test their new product. He also appeared in the film operettas Die Fledermaus/The Bat (Géza von Cziffra, 1962), starring Peter Alexander, Marianne Koch and Marika Rökk, and Der Zigeunerbaron/The Gypsy Baron (Kurt Wilhelm, 1962) with Carlos Thompson and Heidi Brühl. Throughout the 1970s, Willy Millowitsch stuck mostly to the folk theatre. With his son Peter Millowitsch, he appeared in the Roy Black vehicle Alter Kahn und junge Liebe/Old Barge, Young Love (Werner Jacobs, 1973). At the end of the 1980s he returned to television and took the title role in a detective series as Kommissar Klefisch, whom he played until 1996. He played a small part in the Hollywood comedy National Lampoon's European Vacation (Amy Heckerling, 1985) with Chevy Chase. His single line was "Wer zum Teufel waren die Leute?" (Who the devil were those people?). Aside from his theatrical merits, he also wrote classic popular folk songs, such as Schnaps, das war sein letztes Wort and Wir sind alle kleine Sünderlein. He also embraced political causes and in 1992 he participated in the important anti-Nazi campaign, Arsch huh, Zäng ussenander! (Kölsch, meaning: Move your butts and pipe up!), which culminated in a major concert by local acts attended by 100,000 people at Cologne's Chlodwigplatz. In 1989, the city of Cologne conferred honorary citizenship on to Millowitsch, which is a very exclusive honour in Germany. In 1995, he retired from performing for health reasons. He celebrated his 90th birthday on 8 January 1999, with 18,000 fans at a sold-out event at the Köln arena and told people all he wanted for his birthday was to stay healthy. However, Willy Millowitsch died of heart failure on 20 September that year. Two of his four children, Peter Millowitsch, who is now the director of the Volkstheater, and Mariele Millowitsch have continued the family tradition and have both become successful actors. The city of Cologne has named a square near the Millowitsch theatre Willy-Millowitsch-Platz in his honour.
Sources: Wikipedia (English and German), and IMDb.
German postcard by Rüdel Verlag (Franz Josef Rüdel Filmpostkartenverlag, Hamburg-Bergedorf), nr. 3213. Photo: Erwin Schneider.
German actor Matthias Fuchs (1939-2001) was well known as the young Ethelbert in the popular Immenhof film series in the 1950s. Later he evolved into one of the most respected character actors of the German theatre and worked on film and TV with director Rainer Werner Fassbinder.
Matthias Fuchs was born in Hannover, Germany, in 1939. He became known in the role of Ethelbert in the Heimat comedies about the Immenhof farm, at the side of Angelika Meissner and Heidi Brühl. He made his film debut in the first part of the series, Die Mädels vom Immenhof/The Girls from Immenhof (1955, Wolfgang Schleif) and also appeared in the sequels Hochzeit auf Immenhof/Wedding at Immenhof (1956, Volker von Collande) and Ferien auf Immenhof/Holiday at Immenhof (1957, Hermann Leitner). Other films in which he appeared were Der erste Frühlingstag/The First day of Spring (1956, Helmut Weiss) with Luise Ullrich, the historically unaccurate war film U47 - Kapitänleutnant Prien/ U-47 Lt. Commander Prien (1958, Harald Reinl), the comedy-fantasy Der Engel, der seine Harfe versetzte/The Angel Who Pawned Her Harp (1959, Kurt Hoffmann) and the Thomas Mann adaptation Buddenbrooks - 2. Teil/Buddenbrooks, part 2 (1959, Alfred Weidenmann) starring Liselotte Pulver.
After attending drama school Matthias Fuchs evolved into one of the most respected character actors of the German theater. Throughout his life he was closely associated with the Deutsches Schauspielhaus in Hamburg. Famous became his work with director Peter Zadek. During the 1960’s and 1970’s he also appeared in TV films and he played supporting parts in films like Das Mädchen und der Staatsanwalt/The Girl and the District Attorney (1962, Jürgen Goslar) with Elke Sommer, The Cardinal (1963, Otto Preminger), and Mutter Küsters' Fahrt zum Himmel/Mother Kusters Goes to Heaven (1975, Rainer Werner Fassbinder) with Brigitte Mira. He also appeared in Aus einem deutschen Leben/Death Is My Trade (1977, Theodor Kotulla), a disturbing biography of Rudolph Höss, the commandant of Auschwitz II-Birkenau, played by Götz George.
Matthias Fuchs worked several times with director Rainer Werner Fassbinder, including the TVMini-series Berlin Alexanderplatz (1980) and the second chapter of Fassbinder's BRD Trilogy, Lola (1981) starring Barbara Sukowa. Other interesting films were Die flambierte Frau/A Woman in Flames (1983, Robert van Ackeren) starring Gudrun Landgrebe, Decoder (1983, Muscha), and the Sci-Fi film Das Arche Noah Prinzip/The Noah’s Ark Principle (1984, Roland Emmerich). The latter was the most expensive (about 1.2 million DM) student film ever made in Germany. On TV he guest-starred in popular Krimi series like Der Fahnder/ The Investigator (1988), Der Alte/The Old Fox (1989) and Derrick (1990). He regularly appeared in films such as the comedy Rotwang muß weg!/Rotwang Must Go (1994, Hans-Christoph Blumenberg), a spoof of Jurassic Park with Udo Kier, and the creepy thriller Der Totmacher/Deathmaker (1995, Romuald Karmakar) starring Götz George. Also interesting is Beim nächsten Kuß knall ich ihn nieder (1996), a biography of German film director Reinhold Schünzel, who had to emigrate from Germany in the 1930s, and went to Hollywood. After the death of Peter Pasetti, Fuchs represented from 1995 until his death in 2001, the role of the narrator in 39 episodes of the radio drama series, Die drei????/the three???? (Episode 65 to 103). He was a narrator of television documentaries and the animation series Max und Moritz/Max and Moritz (1999, Veit Vollmer). Matthias Fuchs died of lung cancer in 2001 in Hamburg, Germany. His final film was Prüfstand VII/Test Stand VII (2002, Robert Bramkamp) with Robert Forster.
Sources: Wikipedia, and IMDb.
German postcard by Terra-Color, no. F 123.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was a German participant in the Eurovision Song Contest.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards. Already more than 4 million views!
German postcard by Kolibri-Verlag G.m.b.H., Minden/Westf., no. 361. Photo: CCC / Krau. Publicity still for Die Frühreifen/The precocious (Josef von Báky, 1957).
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was the German participant at the Eurovision Song Contest.
Handsome Christian Wolff (1938) was the young lover of many German films of the late 1950s. He started out in the controversial 'gay' film Anders als Du und Ich/The Third Sex (1957) and later became a popular TV star in the long running family series Forsthaus Falkenau (1989-2006).
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German promotion card by Polydor.
Willy Millowitsch (1909-1999) was a popular German stage and TV actor and the director of the Volkstheater Millowitsch in Cologne. From 1949 on, he appeared in many West-German and Austrian films.
Willy Millowitsch was born in Cologne in the Rhineland region in Germany, in 1909. His parents were Peter and Käthe Millowitsch and came from a long family tradition of engagement with the theatre which can be traced back to 1792. It was not until 1895 however, that Millowitsch's grandfather stopped using puppets and resorted to real actors instead. Millowitsch was interested in theatre at an early age, and took to the stage for the first time in 1922 at just 13. According to IMDb, he had intended to become an engineer, but he quit school without a degree to pursue his acting career full-time. At first, he worked under the auspices of his father who had to give up his theatre after the inflation hit. This forced them to go on tour in and around Cologne until they got a permanent theatre in 1936, the now famous Volkstheater Millowitsch, which Willy took over from his father in 1940. In 1933, he had his first film appearances in two short film comedies, So leben wir alle Tage/That’s how we always live (Hasso Preiß, 1933) and Wenn Männer kochen/When men cook (Hasso Preiß, 1933). In 1939 he married his first wife Lini Lüttgen, but they got divorced soon after. During World War II, the theatre was damaged, but not severely, and by October 1945 it was fully restored, owing to the support of mayor and later German chancellor, Konrad Adenauer, who proclaimed that the people need something to laugh about again. Consequently, in the time from 1945 to 1949 there were daily performances in the theatre. It was during this time that he met his second wife, Gerda Millowitsch, formerly Feldhoff. They remained married till his death.
In 1949, when the post-war theatre euphoria died down, Willy Millowitsch focused on his film and television career. In 1949 he played a supporting part in the West-German crime film Gesucht wird Majora/Search for Majora (Hermann Pfeiffer, 1949) starring Lotte Koch. Next, he appeared in the drama Madonna in Ketten/Madonna in Chains (Gerhard Lamprecht, 1949), starring Lotte Koch, Karin Hardt and Elisabeth Flickenschildt. He also appeared in one of the last Harry Piel adventure films, Der Tiger Akbar/Tiger’s Claw (Harry Piel, 1951). Many more films were to follow. He did not content himself just transferring from one medium to the other, but brought the theatre with him. In 1953 the Kölsch (Cologne dialect) play Der Etappenhase (The stage hare) was broadcast on the TV channel WDR, the first live broadcast of a theatrical performance with real audience in German television history. Despite bitter criticism of the entry of low 'folk culture' into television by the director of the NDR channel, Adolf Grimme, it was an instant success. This remains one of Millowitsch's most popular plays and has been performed more than 1,000 times. Der Etappenhase was so popular that just six weeks later it was broadcast again, live from the Volkstheater. In 1957, it was made into a film, Der Etappenhase (Wolfgang Becker, 1957), but with Beppo Brem in the leading role and Millowitsch in a supporting part. Millowitsch continued to put on television plays that were instant successes, gaining national popularity. It is in great part Millowitsch's achievement to have popularised Kölsch throughout Germany. People were now associating the Rhinelander with a relaxed lifestyle and genial humour. Theatres from other dialectal areas scrambled to catch up with him and soon the dialect theatre became an important part of the German television landscape. With the success of these plays on television, interest in theatre gradually increased and by the 1960s flocks of people took to the theatre again to witness performance of Millowitsch's popular plays first hand. Until the beginning of the 1960s Millowitsch had to rent out his theatre now and again, but with the arrival of the new crowds Millowitsch could afford to concentrate his career on theatre from then on. He renovated the theatre in 1967 and the Volkstheater once again became a focal point of local culture, and many young dialect artists started their careers there.
In the early 1960s, Willy Millowitsch had also moved on from supporting to starring parts in films. He was the title figure in the West German comedy Der wahre Jakob/The True Jacob (Rudolf Schündler, 1960) and his co-stars were Renate Ewert and Jane Tilden. The film was a remake of the popular German comedy Der wahre Jakob/True Jacob (Hans Steihoff, 1931), starring Ralph Arthur Roberts. Next Millowitsch starred in Willy, der Privatdetektiv/Willy the Private Detective (Rudolf Schündler, 1960) with Renate Mannhardt and Rudolf Platte, Der Hochtourist/The high-season tourist (Ulrich Erfurth, 1961) with Claude Farell, and Robert und Bertram/Robert und Bertram (Hans Deppe, 1961) opposite Vico Torriani and Trude Herr. The latter comedy was inspired by the characters in Gustav Raeder's 1856 play Robert and Bertram, updated to the modern era. Two vagabonds, Robert and Bertram, are hired by a shoe company to walk 500 kilometres to test their new product. He also appeared in the film operettas Die Fledermaus/The Bat (Géza von Cziffra, 1962), starring Peter Alexander, Marianne Koch and Marika Rökk, and Der Zigeunerbaron/The Gypsy Baron (Kurt Wilhelm, 1962) with Carlos Thompson and Heidi Brühl. Throughout the 1970s, Willy Millowitsch stuck mostly to the folk theatre. With his son Peter Millowitsch, he appeared in the Roy Black vehicle Alter Kahn und junge Liebe/Old Barge, Young Love (Werner Jacobs, 1973). At the end of the 1980s he returned to television and took the title role in a detective series as Kommissar Klefisch, whom he played until 1996. He played a small part in the Hollywood comedy National Lampoon's European Vacation (Amy Heckerling, 1985) with Chevy Chase. His single line was "Wer zum Teufel waren die Leute?" (Who the devil were those people?). Aside from his theatrical merits, he also wrote classic popular folk songs, such as Schnaps, das war sein letztes Wort and Wir sind alle kleine Sünderlein. He also embraced political causes and in 1992 he participated in the important anti-Nazi campaign, Arsch huh, Zäng ussenander! (Kölsch, meaning: Move your butts and pipe up!), which culminated in a major concert by local acts attended by 100,000 people at Cologne's Chlodwigplatz. In 1989, the city of Cologne conferred honorary citizenship on to Millowitsch, which is a very exclusive honour in Germany. In 1995, he retired from performing for health reasons. He celebrated his 90th birthday on 8 January 1999, with 18,000 fans at a sold-out event at the Köln arena and told people all he wanted for his birthday was to stay healthy. However, Willy Millowitsch died of heart failure on 20 September that year. Two of his four children, Peter Millowitsch, who is now the director of the Volkstheater, and Mariele Millowitsch have continued the family tradition and have both become successful actors. The city of Cologne has named a square near the Millowitsch theatre Willy-Millowitsch-Platz in his honour.
Sources: Wikipedia (English and German), and IMDb.
German postcard by Netter's Starverlag, Berlin. Photo: publicity still for the play Der Fronthahn/The Front Rooster.
Willy Millowitsch (1909-1999) was a popular German stage and TV actor and the director of the Volkstheater Millowitsch in Cologne. From 1949 on, he appeared in many West-German and Austrian films.
Willy Millowitsch was born in Cologne in the Rhineland region in Germany, in 1909. His parents were Peter and Käthe Millowitsch and came from a long family tradition of engagement with the theatre which can be traced back to 1792. It was not until 1895 however, that Millowitsch's grandfather stopped using puppets and resorted to real actors instead. Millowitsch was interested in theatre at an early age, and took to the stage for the first time in 1922 at just 13. According to IMDb, he had intended to become an engineer, but he quit school without a degree to pursue his acting career full-time. At first, he worked under the auspices of his father who had to give up his theatre after the inflation hit. This forced them to go on tour in and around Cologne until they got a permanent theatre in 1936, the now famous Volkstheater Millowitsch, which Willy took over from his father in 1940. In 1933, he had his first film appearances in two short film comedies, So leben wir alle Tage/That’s how we always live (Hasso Preiß, 1933) and Wenn Männer kochen/When men cook (Hasso Preiß, 1933). In 1939 he married his first wife Lini Lüttgen, but they got divorced soon after. During World War II, the theatre was damaged, but not severely, and by October 1945 it was fully restored, owing to the support of mayor and later German chancellor, Konrad Adenauer, who proclaimed that the people need something to laugh about again. Consequently, in the time from 1945 to 1949 there were daily performances in the theatre. It was during this time that he met his second wife, Gerda Millowitsch, formerly Feldhoff. They remained married till his death.
In 1949, when the post-war theatre euphoria died down, Willy Millowitsch focused on his film and television career. In 1949 he played a supporting part in the West-German crime film Gesucht wird Majora/Search for Majora (Hermann Pfeiffer, 1949) starring Lotte Koch. Next, he appeared in the drama Madonna in Ketten/Madonna in Chains (Gerhard Lamprecht, 1949), starring Lotte Koch, Karin Hardt and Elisabeth Flickenschildt. He also appeared in one of the last Harry Piel adventure films, Der Tiger Akbar/Tiger’s Claw (Harry Piel, 1951). Many more films were to follow. He did not content himself just transferring from one medium to the other, but brought the theatre with him. In 1953 the Kölsch (Cologne dialect) play Der Etappenhase (The stage hare) was broadcast on the TV channel WDR, the first live broadcast of a theatrical performance with real audience in German television history. Despite bitter criticism of the entry of low 'folk culture' into television by the director of the NDR channel, Adolf Grimme, it was an instant success. This remains one of Millowitsch's most popular plays and has been performed more than 1,000 times. Der Etappenhase was so popular that just six weeks later it was broadcast again, live from the Volkstheater. In 1957, it was made into a film, Der Etappenhase (Wolfgang Becker, 1957), but with Beppo Brem in the leading role and Millowitsch in a supporting part. Millowitsch continued to put on television plays that were instant successes, gaining national popularity. It is in great part Millowitsch's achievement to have popularised Kölsch throughout Germany. People were now associating the Rhinelander with a relaxed lifestyle and genial humour. Theatres from other dialectal areas scrambled to catch up with him and soon the dialect theatre became an important part of the German television landscape. With the success of these plays on television, interest in theatre gradually increased and by the 1960s flocks of people took to the theatre again to witness performance of Millowitsch's popular plays first hand. Until the beginning of the 1960s Millowitsch had to rent out his theatre now and again, but with the arrival of the new crowds Millowitsch could afford to concentrate his career on theatre from then on. He renovated the theatre in 1967 and the Volkstheater once again became a focal point of local culture, and many young dialect artists started their careers there.
In the early 1960s, Willy Millowitsch had also moved on from supporting to starring parts in films. He was the title figure in the West German comedy Der wahre Jakob/The True Jacob (Rudolf Schündler, 1960) and his co-stars were Renate Ewert and Jane Tilden. The film was a remake of the popular German comedy Der wahre Jakob/True Jacob (Hans Steihoff, 1931), starring Ralph Arthur Roberts. Next Millowitsch starred in Willy, der Privatdetektiv/Willy the Private Detective (Rudolf Schündler, 1960) with Renate Mannhardt and Rudolf Platte, Der Hochtourist/The high-season tourist (Ulrich Erfurth, 1961) with Claude Farell, and Robert und Bertram/Robert und Bertram (Hans Deppe, 1961) opposite Vico Torriani and Trude Herr. The latter comedy was inspired by the characters in Gustav Raeder's 1856 play Robert and Bertram, updated to the modern era. Two vagabonds, Robert and Bertram, are hired by a shoe company to walk 500 kilometres to test their new product. He also appeared in the film operettas Die Fledermaus/The Bat (Géza von Cziffra, 1962), starring Peter Alexander, Marianne Koch and Marika Rökk, and Der Zigeunerbaron/The Gypsy Baron (Kurt Wilhelm, 1962) with Carlos Thompson and Heidi Brühl. Throughout the 1970s, Willy Millowitsch stuck mostly to the folk theatre. With his son Peter Millowitsch, he appeared in the Roy Black vehicle Alter Kahn und junge Liebe/Old Barge, Young Love (Werner Jacobs, 1973). At the end of the 1980s he returned to television and took the title role in a detective series as Kommissar Klefisch, whom he played until 1996. He played a small part in the Hollywood comedy National Lampoon's European Vacation (Amy Heckerling, 1985) with Chevy Chase. His single line was "Wer zum Teufel waren die Leute?" (Who the devil were those people?). Aside from his theatrical merits, he also wrote classic popular folk songs, such as Schnaps, das war sein letztes Wort and Wir sind alle kleine Sünderlein. He also embraced political causes and in 1992 he participated in the important anti-Nazi campaign, Arsch huh, Zäng ussenander! (Kölsch, meaning: Move your butts and pipe up!), which culminated in a major concert by local acts attended by 100,000 people at Cologne's Chlodwigplatz. In 1989, the city of Cologne conferred honorary citizenship on to Millowitsch, which is a very exclusive honour in Germany. In 1995, he retired from performing for health reasons. He celebrated his 90th birthday on 8 January 1999, with 18,000 fans at a sold-out event at the Köln arena and told people all he wanted for his birthday was to stay healthy. However, Willy Millowitsch died of heart failure on 20 September that year. Two of his four children, Peter Millowitsch, who is now the director of the Volkstheater, and Mariele Millowitsch have continued the family tradition and have both become successful actors. The city of Cologne has named a square near the Millowitsch theatre Willy-Millowitsch-Platz in his honour.
Sources: Wikipedia (English and German), and IMDb.
Pleasant strangers, anywhere, are always nice.
Rod Stewart photo by Randee St. Nicholas -- www.randeestnicholas.com/
www.youtube.com/watch?v=sH42TRjbYyY&ab_channel=RodSte... -- JODIE by Rod Stewart
www.youtube.com/watch?v=5EdmHSTwmWY&ab_channel=Vaness... -- ...BEST FOR LAST by Vanessa Williams
www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpOqSNGU80E&ab_channel=RodSte... -- TRADE WINDS from A NIGHT ON THE TOWN LP by Rod Stewart 1976/Cover Art Direction by RS
www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qHKX0CXlCE&ab_channel=RodSte... -- 10-second Scotch promo.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3F1_inHijg&ab_channel=BlueSi... -- Heidi Brühl -- WIR WOLLEN NIEMALS AUSEINANDERGEHN ("We Never Want to Be Apart") Reminds me of a Jackie Gleason chart.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJ_9Odmb5o0&ab_channel=Schall... -- MASTER JACK by Heidi Brühl
media.gettyimages.com/id/541081741/photo/nazi-leadership-...
-- Left to Right: Frau Göring, Führer Schicklgruber, Reich Minister of Propaganda Goebbels and Reichsmarschall Göring on a night out in Berlin: every picture tells a story. [The Hitler surname is probably based on "one who lives in a hut" (German, Hütte for "hut">"Hütteler").]
www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHF1sR1QxRQ&ab_channel=EltonJ... -- SPIRIT IN THE SKY by Elton John
www.flickr.com/photos/marklongoartanddesign/15993933380/i... -- Frank and Dean meet Hermione Baddely.
www.flickr.com/photos/marklongoartanddesign/39416712870/i... -- THE AMAZING STRUMBELLO
www.flickr.com/photos/67984075@N03/48689554316/in/photost... -- FOUR WOLVES original photo by Bruno Ganz, shot while on location filming NOSFERATU: PHANTOM DER NACHT, with Klaus Kinski and director Werner Herzog: BARRIER BREACH by ML.
www.flickr.com/photos/marklongoartanddesign/48775654598/i... -- Favorite BALTIMORE RAVEN: Ed Reed. He broke Rod Woodson's NFL record for Most Interception Return Yards.
German postcard by Ufa/Film-Foto, no. FK 1727. Photo: Wesel / Berolina / Constantin Film.
German actor Pero Alexander (1921) played in a dozen Heimat films and other light entertainment pictures of the 1950’s.
His birthname was Hans Eduard Pfingstler and he was in his early films sometimes featured as Peter Alexander. In 1952 he made his film debut in Straße zur Heimat (1952, Romano Mengon). Soon followed supporting roles in more Heimat films like Wetterleuchten am Dachstein (1953, Anton Kutter) with Marianne Koch and Einmal kehr' ich wieder... Dalmatinische Hochzeit (1953, Géza von Bolváry) with Paul Dahlke. His first leading part was in the drama Maria Johanna (1953), which was directed by Swedish film star Signe Hasso and her former husband Harry Hasso. He had a small role in the white slavery melodrama Mannequins für Rio (1954, Kurt Neumann), a German-American coproduction starring Johanna Matz, Scott Brady and Raymond Burr. Other films were the musical comedy Sonne über der Adria (1954, Karl Georg Külb) and the Heinz Rühmann comedy Wenn der Vater mit dem Sohne (1955, Hans Quest).
In the second half of the 1950’s Pero Alexander played more supporting parts in Mädchen ohne Grenzen (1955, Géza von Radványi), starring Sonja Ziemann and Ivan Desny, Das Schloß in Tirol (1957, Géza von Radványi), starring Karlheinz Böhm and Erika Remberg, and Vater, Mutter und neun Kinder (1958, Erich Engels). He played a romantic lead opposite Heidi Brühl in Vater, unser bestes Stück (1957, Günther Lüders) and played then in the crime dramas Das Nachtlokal zum Silbermond (1959, Wolfgang Glück) and Orientalische Nächte (1960, Heinz Paul), both starring Marina Petrova. In the early 1960’s he played his last film roles in Hohe Tannen (1960, August Rieger), Treibjagd auf ein Leben (1961, Ralph Lothar) and Das Mädchen auf der Titelseite (1961, Fritz Bornemann). More biographical information was not to be found on the net.
Sources: Filmportal.de and IMDb.
Hemlock (Clint Eastwood) travels to Switzerland with Bowman (George Kennedy), the "ground man" or supervisor of the climb and meets the other members of the climbing party at the Hotel Bellevue des Alpes at Kleine Scheidegg.
Dutch postcard, nr. 14.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was the Doris Day of Germany.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.
German postcard by Kunst und Bild, Berlin, no. F 10. Photo: A. Grimm / CCC / Deutsche London. Angelika Meissner in Der erste Frühlingstag/The first day of spring (Helmut Weiss, 1956).
German actress Angelika Meissner (1940) was a child star of German cinema in the 1950s. She became known with the three popular Immenhof films.
Angelika Meissner, a.k.a. Angelika Voelkner and Angelika Meissner-Voelkner, was born in, 1940 in Berlin. Her father was composer Peter Heinz Voelkner. Her mother, Hildegard Voelkner, nee Meissner, was the head of the advertising department at UFA. In 1949, Angelika played her first film role in the drama Nachtwache/Keepers of the Night (Harald Braun, 1949) as the little daughter of Hans Nielsen. In her second film Der fallende Stern/The Falling Star (1950), she epitomised Elisabeth Hollreiser, traumatised by the post-war turmoil, as a ten-year-old girl. Maria Wimmer played the adult Elisabeth. In the Dieter Borsche film Vater braucht eine Frau/Father Needs a Wife (Harald Braun, 1952), she played the cute Ulla who searches with her siblings in newspaper advertisements a new wife for her widowed father. Finally, she also finds her in Susanne (Ruth Leuwerik). In these early films, she appeared as Angelika Voelkner. Later, in Die Mädels vom Immenhof she is credited as Angelika Meissner-Voelkner, while in vacation at Immenhof she is credited as Angelika Meissner. The name change was a consequence of the divorce of the parents, and Angelika and her brother both adopted the birth name of their mother.
Angelika Meissner became known in the role of Barbara (nicknamed Dick) in Die Mädels vom Immenhof/The Girls from Immenhof (Wolfgang Schleif, 1955) with Heidi Brühl as her sister Dalli and Margarete Haagen as Grandma Jantzen. The film on a farm with Icelandic horses became a blockbuster. Meissner also appeared in the sequels, Hochzeit auf Immenhof/Wedding at Immenhof (Volker von Collande, 1956) and Ferien auf Immenhof/Holiday at Immenhof (Hermann Leitner, 1957).With Matthias Fuchs, Ethelbert in the Immenhof films, she met again, now as a pretty teenager, in the film Der erste Frühlingstag/The first spring day (Helmut Weiss, 1956). She was one of the charming and lively daughters of Heinz Erhardt in his film Witwer mit 5 Töchtern/Widower with five daughters (Erich Engels, 1957). The others were played by Susanne Cramer, Vera Tschechowa, Elke Aberle and Christine Kaufmann. In her last film, the Heimatfilm Hubertusjagd/ Hubertus Hunt (Hermann Kugelstadt, 1959), she appeared once more with Raidar Müller, Ralf from the Immenhof-films. Then she abruptly ended her acting career, retired to private life. Wikipedia cites Micaela Jary, who writes in her book Traumfabriken made in Germany. Die Geschichte des deutschen Nachkriegsfilms 1945–1960 (Dream factories made in Germany. The story of the German post-war film 1945-1960) hat Meissner's mother, in anticipation of future salaries, was deeply in debt to her daughter and was ‘film obsessed’. Angelika Meissner could not withstand the resulting pressure and separated. In 1963, she only played one more role in a German TV film. She studied architecture and moved to Canada, where she occasionally worked as an architect. In German speaking countries, even after sixty tears, Angelika Meissner is not forgotten and her Immenhof films are still popular among old and new fans.
Sources: Stephanie D’heil (Steffi-Line – German), Wikipedia (German) and IMDb.
German postcard by Krüger, nr. 902/30. Photo: Philips.
Blonde, blue-eyed schlager singer and film star Heidi Brühl (1942-1991) was called 'the Doris Day of Germany'. In 1963 she was the German participant at the Eurovision Song Contest.
For more postcards, a bio and clips check out our blog European Film Star Postcards.