Michael Degen (31 January 1928 – 9 April 2022) was a German-Israeli actor, in film and theatre, as well as a theatre director and writer.
Early life
Born in
Chemnitz
Chemnitz (; from 1953 to 1990: Karl-Marx-Stadt , ) is the third-largest city in the German state of Saxony after Leipzig and Dresden. It is the 28th largest city of Germany as well as the fourth largest city in the area of former East Germany a ...
as the younger son of Jewish parents,
[Deutsches Filmhaus: Degen](_blank)
/ref> Degen survived the Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...
in Berlin, while his older brother was sent to Palestine via Denmark and Sweden. His father, Jacob Degen, was a language professor and businessman of Russian Jewish descent. On 13 September 1939, Jacob Degen was arrested by the Secret State Police and taken to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp
Sachsenhausen () or Sachsenhausen-Oranienburg was a German Nazi concentration camp in Oranienburg, Germany, used from 1936 until April 1945, shortly before the defeat of Nazi Germany in May later that year. It mainly held political prisoners ...
. Subjected to severe abuse over the weeks that followed, he was released on 2 February 1940 but never recovered from his injuries, dying shortly afterward. To survive, Michael and his mother, Anna, hid in a Berlin allotment until the end of the war.
In 1946, Degen appeared on stage for the first time and received his education through a scholarship at the acting school of the Deutsches Theater in East Berlin. In 1949, he emigrated to Israel for two years. Degen served as a soldier in Israel and acted in theatres in Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv-Yafo ( he, תֵּל־אָבִיב-יָפוֹ, translit=Tēl-ʾĀvīv-Yāfō ; ar, تَلّ أَبِيب – يَافَا, translit=Tall ʾAbīb-Yāfā, links=no), often referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the G ...
.
Career
In 1954, Degen joined Bertolt Brecht
Eugen Berthold Friedrich Brecht (10 February 1898 – 14 August 1956), known professionally as Bertolt Brecht, was a German theatre practitioner, playwright, and poet. Coming of age during the Weimar Republic, he had his first successes as a pl ...
's Berliner Ensemble
The Berliner Ensemble () is a German theatre company established by actress Helene Weigel and her husband, playwright Bertolt Brecht, in January 1949 in East Berlin. In the time after Brecht's exile, the company first worked at Wolfgang Langhoff ...
at the Theater am Schiffbauerdamm
The ''Theater am Schiffbauerdamm'' () is a theatre building at the ''Schiffbauerdamm'' riverside in the Mitte district of Berlin, Germany, opened on 19 November 1892. Since 1954, it has been home to the Berliner Ensemble theatre company, founded ...
in East Berlin. In 1955–1956, he worked with the Schauspiel Köln
Schauspiel Köln is a theatre and company in Cologne, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It forms together with the Cologne Opera and other houses the Bühnen der Stadt Köln (Stages of the city of Cologne). The listed building has 830 seats in th ...
. From 1956 to 1963 he was at the Mannheim National Theatre
The Mannheim National Theatre (german: Nationaltheater Mannheim) is a theatre and opera company in Mannheim, Germany, with a variety of performance spaces. It was founded in 1779 and is one of the oldest theatres in Germany.
History
In the 18 ...
, followed by the Schauspiel Frankfurt
The Schauspiel Frankfurt is the municipal theatre company for plays in Frankfurt, Hesse, Germany. It is part of Städtische Bühnen Frankfurt.
History
In the late 1770s the theatre principal Abel Seyler was based in Frankfurt, and established th ...
in 1963–1964. From 1967 to 1973, he worked at the . During his career, he played Shakespeare's Hamlet
''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts ...
300 times. A reviewer of ''The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
'' wrote of Degen's acting in Harry Buckwitz
Harry Buckwitz (13 March 1904 – 28 December 1987) was a German actor, theatre director and theatre manager. He was general manager of the Städtische Bühnen Frankfurt from 1951 and 1967, where he was responsible for opera and plays, and initi ...
's 1965 ''Hamlet'' production at Schauspiel Frankfurt, "Nervously impulsive and sometimes violently emotional". Degen performed in Munich, Salzburg and Hamburg and worked with directors including Ingmar Bergman
Ernst Ingmar Bergman (14 July 1918 – 30 July 2007) was a Swedish film director, screenwriter, Film producer, producer and playwright. Widely considered one of the greatest and most influential filmmakers of all time, his films are known ...
, George Tabori
George Tabori ( György Tábori; 24 May 1914 – 23 July 2007) was a Hungarian writer and theatre director.
Life and career
Tabori was born in Budapest as György Tábori, a son of Kornél and Elsa Tábori. His father Kornél (Cornelius) was m ...
Peter Zadek
Peter Zadek (; 19 May 1926 – 30 July 2009) was a German director of theatre, opera and film, a translator and a screenwriter. He is regarded as one of the greatest directors in German-speaking theater.
Biography
Peter Zadek was born on 19 May ...
and Claude Chabrol
Claude Henri Jean Chabrol (; 24 June 1930 – 12 September 2010) was a French film director and a member of the French New Wave (''nouvelle vague'') group of filmmakers who first came to prominence at the end of the 1950s. Like his colleagues an ...
. He was Moliere's Dom Juan
''Dom Juan ou le Festin de pierre'' ("Don Juan or The Feast of the Stone tatue) is a five-act 1665 comedy by Molière based upon the Spanish legend of Don Juan Tenorio. The aristocrat Dom Juan is a rake who seduces, marries, and abandons Elvir ...
in Ingmar Bergman's production at the Salzburg Festival
The Salzburg Festival (german: Salzburger Festspiele) is a prominent festival of music and drama established in 1920. It is held each summer (for five weeks starting in late July) in the Austrian town of Salzburg, the birthplace of Wolfgang Amad ...
and Adam in Kleist's ''The Broken Jug
''The Broken Jug'' (german: Der zerbrochne Krug, link=no, , also sometimes translated ''The Broken Pitcher'') is a comedy written by the German playwright Heinrich von Kleist. Kleist first conceived the idea for the play in 1801, upon looking at ...
''. He was also a director: his premiere was in Goethe's ''Urfaust
''Faust'' is a tragic play in two parts by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, usually known in English as ''Faust, Part One'' and ''Faust, Part Two''. Nearly all of Part One and the majority of Part Two are written in rhymed verse. Although rarely sta ...
'' in 1972. He was a director for four years at the , Munich. Degen began appearing in films in 1963. In Franz Peter Wirth
Franz Peter Wirth (22 September 1919 in Munich – 17 October 1999 in Berg, Upper Bavaria) was a German film director and screenwriter. His film '' Helden'' was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1958.
Selected fi ...
's ''Buddenbrooks'' television adaptation (1979), he played the role of Bendix Grünlich. He played Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
in Michael Kehlmann Michael Kehlmann (21 September 1927 – 1 December 2005) was an Austrian television film director and theatre director, screenwriter and actor.
During 1951–1953, Kehlmann was the manager of the "Kleines Theater im Konzerthaus", Vienna. He was awa ...
's 1988 film ' as well as Dr Martin Sanders in ''Diese Drombuschs
''Diese Drombuschs'' is a German television series that originally aired on ZDF for six seasons from 1983 to 1994. The show revolves around a typical German middle class family living in the city of Darmstadt.
Cast
* Witta Pohl as Vera Drombu ...
''. His last role was the vain Vice-Questore Patta in the television series ''Donna Leon
Donna Leon (; born in Montclair, New Jersey) is the American author of a series of crime novels set in Venice, Italy, featuring the fictional hero Commissario Guido Brunetti. In 2003, she received the Corine Literature Prize.
Leon lived in Veni ...
''.
Degen wrote in his 1999 debut (''Not All Were Murderers. A childhood in Berlin.'') about his own experiences during the Nazi era.
Personal life
Degen lived with his third wife in Hamburg. He had four children from previous marriages. He was an Israeli and German citizen.
He died on 9 April 2022 in Hamburg, at the age of 94. An obituary of the ''Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
The ''Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung'' (; ''FAZ''; "''Frankfurt General Newspaper''") is a centre-right conservative-liberal and liberal-conservativeHans Magnus Enzensberger: Alter Wein in neuen Schläuchen' (in German). ''Deutschland Radio'', ...
'' called Degen "an actor of melancholic elegance".
Legacy
In 2006, Jo Baier
Jo Baier (born 13 February 1949) is a German film director and writer. He directed more than twenty films since 1982 and is known for '' Operation Valkyrie'' (2004), '' Henri 4'' (2010) and ' (2006). He is married to Gertrud Baier.
Early life an ...
filmed Degen's memoirs with Aaron Altaras and Nadja Uhl
Nadja Uhl (; born 23 May 1972, in Stralsund) is a German actress.
Uhl grew up near Stralsund, in the town of Franzburg. She lived with her mother in a three-generation house, shared with aunts and her grandparents, who had moved in shortly ...
for ARD (').
Awards
* 1969 Großer Hersfeld-Preis
* 1988
* 2003
Selected filmography
Source:
Source:
Writings
* and
*
*
*
*
*
References
Further reading
*
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Degen, Michael
1932 births
2022 deaths
20th-century German Jews
20th-century German male actors
21st-century German male actors
German male film actors
German male television actors
Holocaust survivors
Israeli people of German-Jewish descent
Male actors from Hamburg
Jews from Hamburg
Writers from Hamburg