Showing posts with label Max Schreck. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Max Schreck. Show all posts
Saturday, October 30, 2021
Tuesday, March 7, 2017
Born Today March 7: Anna Magnani
1908-1973
Italian stage and film actress Anna Magnani was born on this day possibly in Rome (some sources cite Egypt as her birthplace). Her parentage remains a mystery. Famed film maker Franco Zeffirelli, who claims to have known her well, stated in a book that she was, in fact, born in Alexandria, Egypt to an Egyptian father and an Italian-Jewish mother. He further states that she was raised in Rome by a grandmother. Whatever the case, she was supposedly sent at age 17 to study at the Eleonora Duse Royal Academy of Dramatic Art; though other sources claim she never formally studied acting. It is known for sure that to support herself, she began to work in nightclubs and cabarets as a singer around this time. She formally started her career on the stage in Italian music halls, singing Italian folk songs--this earned her the nickname "the Italian Edith Piaf." She then began to get parts in speaking roles on the stage as well. She was said to be quick learner and a fine stage actress, and had some success early in her career as a result. She is appearing here because it is thought that her first film appearance came in a late silent filmed in Rome by a German production company. The film Scampolo featured a mostly Italian cast in the lead roles, but also featured German players, even featuring Max Schreck in a smaller role; it was released in 1928. Magnani's part is uncredited. Her first credited role came in 1934 with The Blind Woman of Sorrento. She would go on to have a bright career in film, working with and befriending a wide swath of famous people from Frederico Fellini to Tennessee Williams (a point of trivia: her friendship with Williams became the subject of an off-Broadway play). She is also the grandmother of Italian actress Olivia Magnani, who was born after her death. She died suddenly on the 26th of September 1973 after a battle with pancreatic cancer, she was 65 years old. A huge crowd gathered for her funeral in Rome and she was interred the family mausoleum of Roberto Rossellini, with whom she had a relationship with before he married Ingrid Bergman. She was later moved to the Cimitero Comunale di San Felice Circeo, where she is entombed behind a glass enclosure.
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| Site of her first interment. |
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| Her current resting place. |
For More:
Leave Virtual Flowers @ Find A Grave
Thursday, October 20, 2016
Sunday, September 6, 2015
Born Today September 6: Max Schreck
Max Schreck: 1879-1936
Born Friedrich Gustav Maximillian Schreck on September 6, 1879 in Berlin-Friedenau, Germany, his is the most definitely the most famous face (albeit in heavy makeup) of the silent era in the modern age! Even the youngest people with any passing knowledge of film know his face. For a while as a child he lived in Friedenau proper, which has a very interesting history all it's own. As he got older, he became more and more enamored with the theater, of which is father thoroughly disapproved. His mother, however, secretly gave him money to study acting, which he did enthusiastically, graduating and got work in a number of live productions all across the country until he ended up in Berlin and Munich. It was after this point that he began to work in films. Despite that he's only known widely across the world for Nosferatu (1922), he acted in over 20 silent films (as the silent era lasted much longer in Germany than it did in the US), with his first talkie in 1930 funnily enough being a musical (The Land Of Smiles). Nosferatu was basically the only horror film he acted in, however he was in one Sci-Fi talkie in 1933 entitled The Tunnel. It turns out that the vast majority of the films he appeared in were comedies. He had a reputation of being a rather strange character, a loner, and apparently spent a good deal of time wandering around in forests. Despite this, he apparently also possessed a unique (some said unusual) sense of humor, and like his American contemporary Lon Chaney Sr., he had a talent for playing grotesque characters, and didn't mind make-up jobs, that other actors had no patience for. This was helped by the fact that he stood 6'3". His life was cut short at the age of 56 of a heart attack. Due to his theater training, he had successfully made the transition into talkies, only to pass away from an early onset of heart failure. Right up until his death he continued to do live theater; in fact, the night before his death he took a stand-in role as "The Great Inquisitor" in Don Carlos. His obituary apparently made no mention of Nosferatu (as it was not the well known film then as it became), but rather highly praised a live performance as "The Miser" in a Moliére's comedy. He is buried in the German cemetery located near Brandenburg--Wilmersdorfer Waldfriedhof Stahndorf.
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| Publicity photo of Schreck from 1922, year of Nosferatu |
Silent Film Credits
Der zeugende Tod (1921) (a mystery film)
Nosferatu (1922) (as Graf Orlok, his first Horror film)
Nathan der Weise (1922) (formerly lost film, essentially banned in Bavaria by intimidation from the early Nazi party who considered it "Jewish propaganda." It is a historical drama.)
The Jew of Mestri (1924) (shot in 1923, premiered in Finland in 1924, based on Shakespeare's The Merchant Of Venice.)
Die Straße (1923) (a drama)
The Mysteries Of A Hairdresser's Shop (1923) (comedic short, just over 30 minutes long, this remained an unreleased short for years.)
Finances Of The Grand Duke (1924) (A comedy. A Murnau film, the only other time he worked with the director.)
Am Rande der Welt (1927) (a drama)
The Case Of Captain Ramper (1927) (a drama)
Dona Juana (1928) (a drama)
Luther (1929) (a biographical and historical drama based on the life of Martin Luther. Filmed in 1928.)
Scampolo (1928) (a comedy)
Rasputins Liebesabenteur (1928) (an historical drama)
Teenager's Republic (1929) (filmed in 1928)
Volga, Volga (1928) (a drama)
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| Entrance into the graveyard where Schreck is buried--the whole cemetery is located in an old grove forest. |
Monday, October 31, 2011
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