Gustaf Gründgens

Klaus Mann's book "Mephisto" was banned in Germany in 1966 (after Gründgens' death). However, despite the ban, it was republished in 1981 by Rowohlt Verlag.

Gustaf Gründgens died of an internal hemorrhage on October 7, 1963 in Manila during a world trip.

His single most famous role was that of Mephistopheles in Goethe's Faust in 1956/57, which is still considered by many to have been the best interpretation of the role ever given.

Posthumously, Gründgens was involved in one of the most famous literary cases in 20th-century Germany, as the subject of a novel entitled Mephisto by his former brother-in-law Klaus Mann, who had died in 1949. The novel, a thinly veiled account of Gründgens's life, portrayed its main character ("Hendrik Höfgen") as having shady connections with the Nazi regime. Gründgens's adopted son and heir Peter Gorski, who had directed Faust, in 1966 successfully sued the publisher on his late father's behalf, confirmed by the Federal Court of Justice in 1968.

After the war he had to endure a nine-month lasting Sovjet internment. Only after countless statements of other actors he was released in April 1946. Only one month later he impersonated his first post-war role at the Deutsches Theater Berlin and returned successfully to the scene of his former successes. His marriage with Marianne Hoppe was divorced in the same year.

Imprisoned by the Soviet NKVD in 1945, Gründgens was released thanks to the intercession by the Communist actor Ernst Busch, whom Gründgens himself had saved from execution by the Nazis in 1943. During the denazification process his statements helped to exonerate acting colleagues like Göring's widow Emmy and the director Veit Harlan (Jud Süß).

After Goebbels's total war speech on 18 February 1943, Gründgens volunteered for the Wehrmacht but was again recalled by Göring, who had his name added to the Gottbegnadeten list.

Till the end of war he took part in the movies "Zwei Welten" (1939), "Ohm Krüger" (1941) and "Friedemann Bach (1941), but his main activity was still dedicated to the theater.

Formed his own production company at Terra Filmkunst in 1938.

Became artistic director of the Prussian State Theatre, 1937-45. Appointed by Goering to the Prussian State Council in 1936.

He got married with the actress Marianne Hoppe in 1936.The wedlock was widely seen as a lavender marriage.

He was an actor and director, known for M (1931), Faust (1960) and Friedemann Bach (1941). He was married to Marianne Hoppe and Erika Mann.

From 1930 Gustaf Gründgens began a second successful career in the film business. Especially when he played dubious types he was convincing in an almost worrying way.

He got married with Erika Mann in 1926, the daughter of the famous writer Thomas Mann. The marriage was divorced in 1929.

He intensified his intention to become an actor from 1919 and took acting lessons at the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus. In the following years followed many engagements at different theaters.

The young Gustaf Gründgens volunteered for the military in 1916, immediately after the secondary school and was sent to the Westfront. In 1917 he became a member of the fronttheater company Saarlouis, one year later he managed this company.

Gustaf Gründgens was born on December 22, 1899 in Düsseldorf, Germany as Gustav Heinrich Arnold Gründgens.