Klaus Schwarzkopf (December 18, 1922 † June 21, 1991) was a German actor and voice actor.
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Aidenbach, Landkreis Passau, Bavaria (Bayern), Germany
Klaus Schwarzkopf (December 18, 1922 † June 21, 1991) was a German actor and voice actor.
Schwarzkopf grew up with his mother Gertrud. He had to sleep in a plaster bed for years because of bone tuberculosis. The father had died just a few weeks after the birth of the son. After finishing school, he trained in administration, where he was appointed government inspector. [1] Against the express will of his mother, Schwarzkopf began a four-year acting training in Berlin at the age of 20 – still during the Second World War – which he successfully completed in 1947. [1]
Schwarzkopf made his debut in 1947 as a theater actor under Boleslav Barlog at the Berlin Schlosspark Theater alongside Hildegard Knef. In 1953 Schwarzkopf moved to Wiesbaden, later he was engaged in Hanover and Munich. He became an audience favourite and was appointed "Bavarian State Actor". In the 1970s he appeared in productions of the Thalia Theater in Hamburg (including Gin Romme by James Saunders at the side of Edda Seippel and in 1979 in Boy Gobert's farewell production there, Goethe's Faust. A tragedy and faust. Der Tragödie zweite Teil, in der Inszenierung von Hans Hollmann). In the 1980s, Gobert engaged him at the Staatliche Schauspielbühnen Berlin, where he portrayed the Russian envoy in the German premiere of Sławomir Mrożek's Der Botschafter in 1982 and Hauptmann von Köpenick in Carl Zuckmayer's play of the same name in 1984. Schwarzkopf's repertoire included roles such as the gay hairdresser Harry in Charles Dyer's Under the Stairs and the representative Willy Loman in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, which he described as his favorite role. Schwarzkopf was seen as the scheming secretary Wurm in Schiller's Kabale und Liebe, Hauptmann von Köpenick and Tartuffe and also appeared in contemporary plays such as Frauen vor Flusslandschaft based on the novel of the same name by Heinrich Böll. Until the end of his life, Schwarzkopf was successful as a stage actor in addition to his television career.
Schwarzkopf's television career began in the early 1960s. He has appeared in more than 250 television productions over the decades. He appeared in crime series such as Der Kommissar, Derrick, Das Kriminalmuseum and Der Alte and was repeatedly referred to as the "master of quiet tones". The rounded, small-grown actor often represented rather inconspicuous, "average" characters. In 1969 he appeared in the title role of the television adaptation of Molière's Tartuffe or The Impostor, in 1970 he starred in the crooked comedy The Man Who Sold the Eiffel Tower. Between 1971 and 1978, Schwarzkopf played the always somewhat grumpy Inspector Finke in seven Crime Scene crime novels, who investigated together with his respective assistants in Kiel and the surrounding area. Most finke crime novels were directed by the later Hollywood director Wolfgang Petersen. In 1977, the follow-up certificate of maturity with which the then sixteen-year-old Nastassja Kinski founded her international career, gained particular popularity. Schwarzkopf is also remembered for his portrayal of the banker Kesselmeyer in the television series Die Buddenbrooks (1979). Even in the 80s, Schwarzkopf remained a busy actor on television. He starred, among other things, in the series Wer den Schaden hat ... (1981), in the multi-part Alte Gauner (1985), in Die Stunde des Léon Bisquet (1986) and in the television satire Das blaue Bidet (1982) based on the novel of the same name by Joseph Breitbach, in which a button manufacturer sells all his belongings and wants to spend a holiday on the Mediterranean for the first time. In several episodes of the popular series Praxis Bülowbogen Schwarzkopf impersonated Clochard "Gleisdreieck" from 1987 to 1991. Schwarzkopf starred in feature films such as Herrliche Zeiten im Spessart (1967) and in the Simmel adaptations Und Jimmy ging zum Regenbogen (1971), Der Stoff aus dem die Träume sind (1972) and Alle Menschen werden Brüder (1973). In 1973 he was also seen in the psychological thriller One of us two – as a sociology professor who is blackmailed by a failed student (Jürgen Prochnow). Schwarzkopf made his last cinema appearance in 1985 in Bernhard Wicki's Die Grünstein-Variante. In 1991 he first played one of the leading roles in Dieter Wedel's four-part miniseries Der große Bellheim alongside Mario Adorf, Will Quadflieg and Hans Korte. In June, Schwarzkopf had to stop filming due to his advanced illness; his role was then taken over by Heinz Schubert.
Thanks to his soft, concise voice, Klaus Schwarzkopf was a sought-after voice actor. He gained particular popularity in the 1970s as the German voice of Peter Falk in the role of Inspector Columbo. He also voiced actors such as Gower Champion in the film adaptation of the musical Show Boat Mississippi Melody (1951), William Shatner in Judgment of Nuremberg (1961), Mickey Rooney in In Beirut are the Nights Long (1965), Peter Lorre in The Trail of the Falcon (dubbing of 1969). In addition to Robert Mitchum, Burt Lancaster, Bob Hope, Douglas Fairbanks Jr. and many more, he lent his voice to Tony Curtis in Winchester '73 and Lloyd Bridges in Twelve o'clock noon from 1953. In the Dieter Hallervorden comedy Ach du lieber Harry from 1980 he was the German voice of Jacques Marin.
Schwarzkopf largely kept his private life away from the public eye. In an interview, he once commented:[2] "I missed getting married! The profession is so dominant in my life that private feelings and desires are neglected." His alleged homosexuality was publicly addressed for the first time in the year before his death by the press coverage of a book by Hermann J. Huber, and there was a forced outing, even if Schwarzkopf never took a public position on it. [3][4] Various publications later claimed that Schwarzkopf had a long-standing relationship with former dancer and director Hubertus Moeller (May 20, 1928 - January 5, 2021); [5][6] In an interview in 2016, however, he corrected that there had been a close friendship between him and Schwarzkopf, but never a love affair. [7]
In June 1991, Klaus Schwarzkopf was admitted to Bochum's St. Josef Hospital for acute double-sided pneumonia. [8] His Munich management informed the press that Schwarzkopf did not want to endanger ongoing filming of Der große Bellheim and had therefore delayed "severe pneumonia". [8][9] After his death, German daily newspapers reported that Schwarzkopf had died at the age of 68 as a result of the immunodeficiency disease AIDS. [9] The Munich native found his final resting place in Aidenbach in Lower Bavaria. [10]
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