Martha Novelly
German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 5080. Photo: Atelier Eberth, Berlin.
Martha Novelly (1889-1972) was a German stage and screen actress who peaked in German silent film of the late 1910s.
Martha Novelly was born Martha Buchholz on 14 February 1889 in Hamburg, Germany. At age 15 she debuted on the stage in 1904 in Lübeck. Afterwards, she acted in Flensburg, Oldenburg, Frankfurt (Oder), Chemnitz, Nürnberg and Stuttgart. From 1914 she performed in Berlin at the Lustspielhaus. Just like many of her fellow stage actors in Berlin, she started a film acting career during the First World War. Her first part was that of Edith, one of the general’s daughters in General von Berning (1914), directed by Heinrich Bolten-Baeckers, starring Albert Paul, Aranka Keller, Leo Peuckert and Ernst Hofmann. At about the same time, Novelly also played with Paul, Keller and Hofmann in Bolten-Baeckers’ Um Liebe und Ehre (1914).
While she was absent from the film set in 1915, in 1916 Novelly had the female lead in the Harry Piel adventure film Unter heisser Zone, with Mogens Enger in the lead, and Preben Rist and Viktor Janson as co-stars. The story deals with a captain (Enger) hunting for a precious South African diamond, stolen by a Dutch swindler (Rist) and his American accomplice (Novelly). Shots were taken in Berlin, the Hamburg Zoo and aboard the ship Kaiserin Auguste Viktoria. Until the end of the First World War, it was Piel’s most ambitious production and announced Piel’s post-war specialisation of adventure films with wild animals. The film contained several spectacular scenes, including a lion hunt, a car falling into an abyss, the explosion of a kettle, a chase on a ship, and an explosion of a bridge just before a luxury train arrives, causing only the locomotive to drop down.
Between 1916 and 1918 she was a leading film actress in serious, dramatic films. From 1917 she acted as star in several dramas of the company Astra, directed by Emerich Hanus: Unheilbar (1917) with small parts for Emil Jannings and Werner Krauss, Das Gewissen des Andern (1917) with Bruno Decarli, Brno Kastner and Theodor Loos, E – der scharlachrote Buchstabe (1918) with Krauss, Die Liebe der Maria Bonde (1918) with Hanus himself, Der letzte Liebesdienst (1918), Der Fluch der alten Mühle (1918), Die Sühne (1918) with Kurt Vespermann, Der Ring des Hauses Stillfried (1918), and Es kam der Tag aka Es kommt der Tag (director unknown, 1918).
In Die Sühne, Renate (Novelly) and Ludwig (Vespermann) , who have been friends already in childhood, fall in love with each other. When Ludwig is blinded by accident, Renate takes care of him. She becomes a sculptor and opens a studio in his house. Ludwig starts to flirt with a model, the dancer Sibylle. When a doctor restores his sight, he is appalled by Renate’s loss of beauty and chases the dancer, until he finds out she is only after his money. Clearly, Ludwig needs to be cured of his spiritual blindness as well. A print of the film was found back at the Dutch EYE Filmmuseum and restored in Germany.
In Die Liebe der Maria Bonde, visible online at the site EFG1914, Novelly is Maria Bonde, the middle sister of a family of three daughters. The eldest daughter Gunne (Eva Maria Hartmann) is betrothed to Martin, a circus rider (Hanus) with whom she acts. He instead prefers Maria, declares her his love when she substitutes for Gunne in the circus and elopes with her, causing the death of Gunne. When Maria has a child and cannot perform, it is now her youngest sister Anella to substitute her in the circus. Will Martin dump Maria now? Maria has visions of her deceased sister warning her, and of her mother catching her and Martin kissing. In 1995 Die Liebe der Maria Bonde, and also Die Sühne were part of a travelling film program entitled Rot für Gefahr, Feuer und Liebe. Frühe deutsche Stummfilme, organised by the Stiftung deutsche Kinemathek, Berlin, and the Goethe Institut, Munich.
Few years after her marriage in 1918 Martha Novelly ended her short film career. Her films of 1919 were for the company Deutsche Bioscop: Flitter-Dörtje (Robert Leffler 1919) with Charles Willy Kaiser and Rudolf Klein-Rogge, and Die Geige des Tommaso (Hanus 1919). Novelly’s last films were Cagliostros Totenhand (Nils Olaf Chrisander 1919) with Eugen Klöpfer, and the French production Irène (Marcel Dumont 1920) starring Louise Colliney as Irène and Marcel Vibert. Martha Novelly died on 28 August 1972 in Berlin.
Sources: German Wikipedia, IMDB, filmportal, www.earlycinema.uni-koeln.de/. For Die Liebe der Maria Bonde, see www.europeanfilmgateway.eu/node/33/Die%20Liebe%20der%20Ma....
Martha Novelly
German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 5080. Photo: Atelier Eberth, Berlin.
Martha Novelly (1889-1972) was a German stage and screen actress who peaked in German silent film of the late 1910s.
Martha Novelly was born Martha Buchholz on 14 February 1889 in Hamburg, Germany. At age 15 she debuted on the stage in 1904 in Lübeck. Afterwards, she acted in Flensburg, Oldenburg, Frankfurt (Oder), Chemnitz, Nürnberg and Stuttgart. From 1914 she performed in Berlin at the Lustspielhaus. Just like many of her fellow stage actors in Berlin, she started a film acting career during the First World War. Her first part was that of Edith, one of the general’s daughters in General von Berning (1914), directed by Heinrich Bolten-Baeckers, starring Albert Paul, Aranka Keller, Leo Peuckert and Ernst Hofmann. At about the same time, Novelly also played with Paul, Keller and Hofmann in Bolten-Baeckers’ Um Liebe und Ehre (1914).
While she was absent from the film set in 1915, in 1916 Novelly had the female lead in the Harry Piel adventure film Unter heisser Zone, with Mogens Enger in the lead, and Preben Rist and Viktor Janson as co-stars. The story deals with a captain (Enger) hunting for a precious South African diamond, stolen by a Dutch swindler (Rist) and his American accomplice (Novelly). Shots were taken in Berlin, the Hamburg Zoo and aboard the ship Kaiserin Auguste Viktoria. Until the end of the First World War, it was Piel’s most ambitious production and announced Piel’s post-war specialisation of adventure films with wild animals. The film contained several spectacular scenes, including a lion hunt, a car falling into an abyss, the explosion of a kettle, a chase on a ship, and an explosion of a bridge just before a luxury train arrives, causing only the locomotive to drop down.
Between 1916 and 1918 she was a leading film actress in serious, dramatic films. From 1917 she acted as star in several dramas of the company Astra, directed by Emerich Hanus: Unheilbar (1917) with small parts for Emil Jannings and Werner Krauss, Das Gewissen des Andern (1917) with Bruno Decarli, Brno Kastner and Theodor Loos, E – der scharlachrote Buchstabe (1918) with Krauss, Die Liebe der Maria Bonde (1918) with Hanus himself, Der letzte Liebesdienst (1918), Der Fluch der alten Mühle (1918), Die Sühne (1918) with Kurt Vespermann, Der Ring des Hauses Stillfried (1918), and Es kam der Tag aka Es kommt der Tag (director unknown, 1918).
In Die Sühne, Renate (Novelly) and Ludwig (Vespermann) , who have been friends already in childhood, fall in love with each other. When Ludwig is blinded by accident, Renate takes care of him. She becomes a sculptor and opens a studio in his house. Ludwig starts to flirt with a model, the dancer Sibylle. When a doctor restores his sight, he is appalled by Renate’s loss of beauty and chases the dancer, until he finds out she is only after his money. Clearly, Ludwig needs to be cured of his spiritual blindness as well. A print of the film was found back at the Dutch EYE Filmmuseum and restored in Germany.
In Die Liebe der Maria Bonde, visible online at the site EFG1914, Novelly is Maria Bonde, the middle sister of a family of three daughters. The eldest daughter Gunne (Eva Maria Hartmann) is betrothed to Martin, a circus rider (Hanus) with whom she acts. He instead prefers Maria, declares her his love when she substitutes for Gunne in the circus and elopes with her, causing the death of Gunne. When Maria has a child and cannot perform, it is now her youngest sister Anella to substitute her in the circus. Will Martin dump Maria now? Maria has visions of her deceased sister warning her, and of her mother catching her and Martin kissing. In 1995 Die Liebe der Maria Bonde, and also Die Sühne were part of a travelling film program entitled Rot für Gefahr, Feuer und Liebe. Frühe deutsche Stummfilme, organised by the Stiftung deutsche Kinemathek, Berlin, and the Goethe Institut, Munich.
Few years after her marriage in 1918 Martha Novelly ended her short film career. Her films of 1919 were for the company Deutsche Bioscop: Flitter-Dörtje (Robert Leffler 1919) with Charles Willy Kaiser and Rudolf Klein-Rogge, and Die Geige des Tommaso (Hanus 1919). Novelly’s last films were Cagliostros Totenhand (Nils Olaf Chrisander 1919) with Eugen Klöpfer, and the French production Irène (Marcel Dumont 1920) starring Louise Colliney as Irène and Marcel Vibert. Martha Novelly died on 28 August 1972 in Berlin.
Sources: German Wikipedia, IMDB, filmportal, www.earlycinema.uni-koeln.de/. For Die Liebe der Maria Bonde, see www.europeanfilmgateway.eu/node/33/Die%20Liebe%20der%20Ma....