Hermine Sterler

Last updated
Hermine Sterler
Born
Minna Stern

(1894-03-20)20 March 1894
Died25 May 1982(1982-05-25) (aged 88)
Nationality German
Flag of the United States.svg  United States
OccupationActress
Years active19211966

Minna Stern (20 March 1894 – 25 May 1982), known professionally as Hermine Sterler, was a German-American actress whose career spanned both the silent and the talkie film eras on two continents.

Contents

Career

Sterler, who appeared in several Hollywood films, was once affiliated with the Burgtheater in Vienna. [1]

She debuted in 1918 at the Residenztheater Hannover and later performed in Berlin, where she appeared at the Kleinen Theater ("Little Theater"). She played a saloon lady and, from 1921, often appeared in German silent film. She flourished as a character actor in roles of young wives and mothers. In 1930, she appeared as Tsarina Alexandra Feodorovna in Rasputin, Demon with Women .

In 1933, a German government decree was enacted by Joseph Goebbels under the auspices of a newly created agency called Die Reichskulturkammer. The decree stipulated that Jewish actors were, among other things, prohibited from performing on German stage.

Sterler, who was a Jew, relocated to Vienna in 1933, where she continued to work in theater and cinema. The Anschluss of Austria ended her artistic career there. Sterler next moved to London. In 1938, she immigrated to the United States from Zurich under her birth name Minna Stern. Film director Wilhelm Dieterle gave Sterler her first role in American cinema. [2]

During World War II and after, Sterler played mostly small roles in Hollywood productions portraying German or other European women. In the 1944 anti-Nazi film The Hitler Gang , she played the wife of Ernst Hanfstaengl.

On November 10, 1944, Sterler became a United States naturalized citizen in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California at Los Angeles.

She gave actress Piper Laurie private acting lessons when Laurie was a child. [3]

Death

Hermine Sterler died on 25 May 1982, aged 88, in her native Stuttgart.[ citation needed ]

Selected filmography

Silent film

Talkies

Family

Sterler (née Minna Stern) was born 20 March 1894 in Bad Cannstatt, Stuttgart, to Max Stern (born 1853) and Bertha Wormser (née Bertha Emilia Wormser; 1865–1936), both of whom married each other 5 July 1888.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mady Christians</span> Austrian-born German-American actress

Marguerita Maria Christians, known as Mady Christians, was an Austrian-born German-American actress who had a successful acting career in theatre and film in the United States until she was blacklisted during the McCarthy period.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hilde Hildebrand</span> German actress and singer (1897–1976)

Emma Minna Hilde Hildebrand was a German actress born in Hanover, Germany on 10 September 1897. She died at the age of 78 in Grunewald, Berlin, on 27 May 1976.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ilka Grüning</span> Austrian-Hungarian actress

Ilka Grüning was an Austrian-Hungarian actress. Born in Vienna in the old Austrian-Hungarian Empire, she was one of many Jewish actors and actresses that were forced to flee Europe when the Nazis came to power in 1933. A respected and famous actress of her time in the German-language area, she was forced to play bit parts in Hollywood.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rosa Valetti</span> German actress

Rosa Valetti was a German actress, cabaret performer, and singer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alfred Abel</span> German actor (1879–1937)

Alfred Peter Abel was a German film actor, director, and producer. He appeared in more than 140 silent and sound films between 1913 and 1938. His best-known performance was as Joh Fredersen in Fritz Lang's 1927 film Metropolis.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Blandine Ebinger</span> German actress

Blandine Ebinger was a German actress and chansonniere.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Camilla Spira</span> German actress

Camilla Spira was a German film actress. She appeared in 68 films between 1924 and 1986. She was born in Hamburg, Germany, of Jewish ancestry on her father's side, and died in Berlin, Germany. Her father was the Austrian actor Fritz Spira who died in the Ruma concentration camp in 1943. Her mother was actress Lotte Spira and her sister was the East German actress Steffie Spira.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Trude Hesterberg</span> German actress

Trude Hesterberg was a German film actress. She appeared in 89 films between 1917 and 1964.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hertha von Walther</span> German actress (1903–1987)

Hertha von Walther was a German film actress. She appeared in 80 films between 1921 and 1983.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dorothea Wieck</span> German actress (1908–1986)

Dorothea Wieck, born Dora Bertha Olavia Wieck, was a German theatre and film actress.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Margarete Schön</span> German actress (1895–1985)

Margarete Schön was a German stage and film actress whose career spanned nearly fifty years. She is internationally recognized for her role as Kriemhild in director Fritz Lang's Die Nibelungen series of two silent fantasy films, Die Nibelungen: Siegfried and Nibelungen: Kriemhild's Revenge.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bodil Rosing</span> Danish and American actress (1877–1941)

Bodil Rosing was a Danish stage and American film actress in the silent and sound eras.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Georg Alexander</span> German actor (1888–1945)

Georg Alexander was a German film actor who was a prolific presence in German cinema. He also directed a number of films during the silent era.

Ilse Fürstenberg was a German actress, working on stage, screen, television and as voice actress.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alexa von Porembsky</span> German actress (1906–1981)

Alexa von Porembsky was a Hungarian-born German actress.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fita Benkhoff</span> German actress

Fita Benkhoff was a German actress.

Edith Hancke was a German stage, film and television actress.

Heinrich Gotho was an Austrian film actor. Born in Dolina, he started his acting career at some provincial theatres until he found an engagement at the Neues Volkstheater in Berlin. The character actor appeared in over 50 films between 1922 and 1933, mostly in smaller roles. He notably appeared in numerous films by director Fritz Lang, among them Dr. Mabuse the Gambler (1922), Metropolis (1927) and M (1931). Gotho was forced to retire from film acting in 1933; as a Jew he could no longer work in Nazi Germany. He died in 1938 in the Jewish Hospital of Berlin-Wedding.

The Five Frankfurters is a 1922 German silent historical film directed by Erich Schönfelder. It was based on a 1912 play of the same title about the rise of the Rothschild family.

Else Ehser (1894–1968) was a German stage actress. She also made numerous appearances in German films in supporting roles, such as her performance as Maria Theresa of Spain in the 1935 film The Private Life of Louis XIV.

References

General bibliography

  • Kester, Bernadette. Film Front Weimar: Representations of the First World War in German Films of the Weimar Period (1919-1933). Amsterdam University Press, 2003.

Inline citations

  1. "'William Tell' To Be Presented at El Capitan," Los Angeles Times , May 14, 1939, p., col. 6 (accessible via Newspapers.com at www.newspapers.com/image/385384273 ; subscription required)
  2. "Es wird im Leben dir mehr genommen als gegeben:" Lexikon der aus Deutschland und Österreich emigrierten Filmschaffenden 1933 bis 1945, by Kay Weniger, ACABUS Verlag (de) (2012), p. 486; ISBN   3862820491
  3. Laurie, Piper (2011). Learning to Live Out Loud: A Memoir. ISBN   9780823026685.