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Maximilian Schell is a Actor, Director, Scriptwriter, Producer and Script Autrichien born on 8 december 1930 at Vienna (Austria)

Maximilian Schell

Maximilian Schell
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Birth name Maximilian Schell
Nationality Austria
Birth 8 december 1930 at Vienna (Austria)
Death 1 february 2014 (at 83 years) at Innsbruck (Austria)
Awards Academy Award for Best Actor, Austrian Decoration for Science and Art, Verdienstkreuz 1. Klasse des Verdienstordens der Bundesrepublik Deutschland

Maximilian Schell (8 December 1930 – 1 February 2014) was an Austrian and Swiss film and stage actor, who also wrote, directed and produced some of his own films. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for the 1961 American film Judgment at Nuremberg, his second acting role in Hollywood. His parents were involved in the arts and he grew up surrounded by acting and literature. While he was a child, his family fled Vienna in 1938 when Austria was annexed by Nazi Germany, and they settled in Zurich, Switzerland. After World War II ended, Schell took up acting or directing full-time. He appeared in numerous German films, often anti-war, before moving on to Hollywood.

Schell was top billed in a number of Nazi-era themed films, as he could speak both English and German. Among those were two films for which he received Oscar nominations: The Man in the Glass Booth (1975; best actor), where he played a character with two identities, and Julia (1977; best supporting actor), where he helps the underground in Nazi Germany.

His range of acting went beyond German characters, however, and during his career, he also played personalities as diverse as Venezuelan leader Simón Bolívar, Russian emperor Peter the Great, and scientist Albert Einstein. For his role as Vladimir Lenin in the television film, Stalin (1992), he won the Golden Globe Award. On stage, Schell acted in a number of plays, and his was considered "one of the greatest Hamlets ever."

In Schell's private life, he was an accomplished pianist and conductor, performing with Claudio Abbado and Leonard Bernstein, and with orchestras in Berlin and Vienna. His elder sister, Maria Schell, was also a noted Hollywood actress, about whom he produced the documentary, My Sister Maria, in 2002.

Biography

During the 1960s Schell had a three-year-long affair with Soraya Esfandiary-Bakhtiari, former wife of the last Shah of Iran. In 1985 he met the Russian actress Natalya Andrejchenko, whom he married in June 1986; their daughter Nastassja was born in 1989. After 2002, separated from his wife (whom he divorced in 2005), Schell had a relationship with the Austrian art historian Elisabeth Michitsch. From 2008 he was romantically involved with German opera singer Iva Mihanovic; they eventually married on 20 August 2013.

Schell was a semi-professional pianist for much of his life. He had a piano when he lived in Munich and said that he would play for hours at a time for his own pleasure and to help him relax: "I find I need to rest. An actor must have pauses in between work, to renew himself, to read, to walk, to chop wood."

Conductor Leonard Bernstein claimed that Schell was a "remarkably good pianist." In 1982, on a program filmed for the U.S. television network PBS, before Bernstein conducted the Vienna Philharmonic playing Beethoven symphonies, Schell read from Beethoven's letters to the audience. In 1983, he and Bernstein co-hosted an 11-part TV series, Bernstein/Beethoven, featuring nine live symphonies, along with discussions between Bernstein and Schell about Beethoven's works.
On other occasions, Schell worked with Italian conductor Claudio Abbado and the Berlin Philharmonic, which included a performance in Chicago of Igor Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex, and another in Jerusalem, of Arnold Schoenberg's A Survivor from Warsaw. Schell also produced and directed a number of live operas, including Richard Wagner's Lohengrin for the Los Angeles Opera. He worked on the film project Beethoven's Fidelio, with Plácido Domingo and Kent Nagano.

Schell was a guest professor at the University of Southern California and was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership in Chicago.

Best films

Deep Impact (1998)
(Actor)
The Black Hole (1979)
(Actor)
Julia (1977)
(Actor)
Vampires (1998)
(Actor)
Judgment at Nuremberg (1961)
(Actor)
Topkapi (1964)
(Actor)

Usually with

Dagmar Hirtz
Dagmar Hirtz
(8 films)
Lil Dagover
Lil Dagover
(3 films)
Zev Braun
Zev Braun
(2 films)
Source : Wikidata

Filmography of Maximilian Schell (69 films)

Display filmography as detailed form
YearNameJobRoles
2015Les BrigandsActorMr. Escher
2008The Brothers BloomActorDiamond Dog
2007Le secret des rosesActorKarl Friedrich Weidemann
2006The Shell SeekersActorLawrence Sterne
2004Coast to CoastActorCasimir
2001Festival in CannesActorViktor Kovner
2000I Love You, BabyActorWalter Ekland
1999My Best FiendActor
1999Joan of Arc (miniseries)ActorBrother Jean le Maistre
1998Left LuggageActorMr. Silberschmidt
1998Deep ImpactActorJason Lerner
1998VampiresActorCardinal Alba
1997Telling Lies in AmericaActorDr. Istvan Jonas
1996The Thorn Birds: The Missing YearsActorCardinal Vittorio
1994Little OdessaActorArkady Shapira
1993A Far Off PlaceActorCol. Mopani Theron
1993Candles in the DarkActor, DirectorColonel Arkush
1993AbrahamActorPharao
1993JusticeActorIsaak Kohler
1992Miss Rose WhiteActorMordecai Weiss
1992StalinActorVladimir Lenin
1991Young CatherineActorFrederick the Great
1990The FreshmanActorLarry London
1990You Can't Live Like ThatActorGerman Commentator
1989The Rose GardenActorAaron
1986Peter the Great (miniseries)ActorPeter the Great
1985Man Under SuspicionActorLawyer Landau
1985The Assisi UndergroundActorCol. Müller
1984MarleneActor, Director, ScriptwriterHimself
1983Les îlesActorFabrice
1981The ChosenActorProfessor David Malter
1979The Black HoleActorDr. Hans Reinhardt
1979Avalanche ExpressActorColonel Nikolai Bunin
1979Together?ActorGiovanni
1979Tales from the Vienna WoodsActor, Director, Writer, Producer, ScriptTheatre Visitor
1977Cross of IronActorHauptmann Stransky
1977JuliaActorJohann
1977A Bridge Too FarActorGeneral der Waffen-SS Wilhelm Bittrich
1976St. IvesActorDr. John Constable
1976The ClownProducer
1975The Day That Shook the WorldActorĐuro Šarac
1975End of the GameDirector, Writer, Producer
1975The Man in the Glass BoothActorArthur Goldman
1974The Odessa FileActorEduard Roschmann
1974The RehearsalActor
1973The PedestrianActor, Director, Writer, ProducerAndreas Giese
1972Pope JoanActorAdrian
1972Paulina 1880Actor
1971TrottaScriptwriter
1970First LoveActor, Director, Writer, ProducerVater
1969Simon BolivarActorSimón Bolívar
1968The CastleActor, Writer, ProducerK
1968HeidiActorRichard Sessemann
1968Krakatoa, East of JavaActorCaptain Chris Hanson
1967The Deadly AffairActorDieter Frey
1967CounterpointActorGen. Schiller
1966John F. Kennedy: Years of Lightning, Day of DrumsActorGerman Narrator
1965Return from the AshesActorStanislaw Pilgrin
1964TopkapiActorWalter Harper
1962The Condemned of AltonaActorFranz von Gerlach
1962Five Finger ExerciseActorWalter
1962The Reluctant SaintActorGiuseppe
1962Five Finger ExerciseActorWalter
1961Judgment at NurembergActorHans Rolfe
1961Hamlet, Prince of DenmarkActorHamlet
1958The Young LionsActorCapt. Hardenberg
1957The Last Ones Shall Be FirstActorLorenz Darrandt
1955The Plot to Assassinate HitlerActorMitglied des Kreisauer Kreises
1955Children, Mother, and the GeneralActorSoldat, der nicht mehr mitmacht