Dorothea Wieck

Dorothea Wieck, born Dora Bertha Olavia Wieck (3 January 1908 in Davos, Switzerland – 20 February 1986 in Berlin, West Germany), was a German theatre and film actress.

Dorothea Wieck, in Gohlis, Leipzig (1946)

Early years

Dorothea Wieck was born Dora Bertha Olavia Wieck and grew up in southern Germany and Sweden. She was descended from musician Clara Schumann.[1]

By the time Wieck was six years old, her father (an artist) and her mother (a musician) felt that she should be an actress. She imitated people who visited their home, and she wrote short plays for her friends and herself. She attended an academy that trained her in music, dancing, and art, but not in acting. When she was 15 years old, she began studying under Max Reinhardt and went to the Josephstaedter Theatre in Vienna, where she began to act.[2]

Career

Wieck launched her acting career on stage in 1924 and made her screen debut in German films in 1926,[1] appearing in several silent films. She became widely known through her leading role in the 1931 film Mädchen in Uniform (Girls in Uniform). Her American film debut came in Cradle Song (1933).[3]

Wieck appeared in around 50 films and played on the stages of many large theatres, notably at the Deutsches Theater and the Schillertheater, Berlin. She also worked as a theatre director. After World War II, she appeared in films only in supporting roles, and she withdrew from films almost entirely in the early 1960s. In 1973, Wieck received the Film Ribbon in Gold of the Deutscher Filmpreis for long and outstanding achievements in German film.

Personal life and death
Dorothea Wieck is buried in Friedhof Heerstraße, Berlin-Westend

Wieck was married to Baron Ernest von der Decken, "a man of reputed influence in the Nazi regime".[4] During World War II, German Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels gave a reception at which Wieck was the guest of honor.[4]

DNB, the German official news agency, erroneously reported in March 1945 that Wieck had been killed in an air attack on Dresden by Allied forces.[5]

She actually died on 20 February 1986 in Berlin, West Germany, aged 78. She is buried at the cemetery Friedhof Heerstraße in Berlin.

Partial filmography

References
  1. Bock, ans-Michael; Bergfelder, im (2009). The Concise Cinegraph: Encyclopaedia of German Cinema. Berghahn Books. p. 530. ISBN 9780857455659. Retrieved 4 March 2017.
  2. Loring, Woodrow (January 1934). "Maedchen in Hollywood". Hollywood. 23 (1): 39, 66. Retrieved October 25, 2021.
  3. Reid, Larry (January 1934). "Taking in the Talkies". Movie Classic. 5 (5): 10. Retrieved December 11, 2020.
  4. Waldman, Harry; Slide, Anthony (1996). Hollywood and the Foreign Touch: A Dictionary of Foreign Filmmakers and Their Films from America, 1910-1995. Scarecrow Press. pp. 306–308. ISBN 9780810831926. Retrieved 4 March 2017.
  5. "Hitler favorite killed". The New York Times. Associated Press. March 13, 1945. p. 4. Retrieved October 25, 2021.

Notes
  1. Anastasia, die letzte Zarentochter (1956) is not to be confused with Anastasia, also from 1956.
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