Maximilian Schell, an Austrian citizen and Swiss by birth, was not only an outstanding actor, but also a director, writer and producer. However, the general public recognized him and remembered after the release in 1960 of the film "The Nuremberg Trials" directed by Stanley Kramer. The talented game of the Austrian was awarded the Oscar.
A Brief Biography of Maximilian Shell
He was born in Vienna in a prosperous Catholic family. His mother was an actress, and his father was a playwright. The family fled the Austrian capital in 1938 and settled in Zurich, Switzerland. Young Maximilian studied in Zurich, and then in Munich, German studies, literature, theater, art history and musicology. He served in the Swiss army, and at the age of 22 began a professional acting career. His first appearance on stage took place at the age of three in one of his father's plays.
Theatrical career
The debut took place in 1953 on the stage of the City Theater while studying at the Conservatory of Bern. Maximilian Shell showed himself as an actor, playwright and director at the same time. Over the next few years, he moved from one theater to another, but eventually in 1959 he chose the Chamber Theater in German Munich. Soon, however, accepting the tempting offer of Gustaf Grundgens, he moved to Hamburg, where he worked until 1963.
The actor in the late 60s moved to London. In the English capital, for a long time he was engaged in the translation of Shakespearean plays and poems. He worked in the theater. So, in 1978 he received an important and significant role for him in the theater world in the play “Namerek”, which he performed for four years. In parallel, Maximilian Shell worked on the production of operas and conducted directorial activities. In 2007, she staged the Vienna Blood operetta written by Johann Strauss. The success was overwhelming, she surprised the theater world.
The beginning of the way
Shell gained world fame thanks to film and television. The first successful work in his career was the role of a deserter in the military drama "Children, Mother and General." The film attracted international attention, partly because of its director Laszlo Benedek, and also because of his anti-war position. This was followed by the melodrama “The Girl from Flanders” (1956), the crime drama of 1957 “And the Last Will Be the First”, the military drama “Young Lions” (1958) by Edward Dmitrik, where he played the captain of the German army, the adventure film “Three The Musketeer "(1960).
Winner of the Oscars and Golden Globes
In 1960, he joined the cast of the legal cinema drama Nuremberg Trial, in which he played the lawyer Hans Rolf. The partners on the set were Bert Lancaster, Marlene Dietrich, Spencer Tracy, Richard Widmark, Judy Garland. For the brilliant performance of the role in 1961, actor Maximilian Shell received an Oscar and a Golden Globe. The picture brought him world fame as a serious dramatic actor.
Careers in film and television
The period after the Oscars was the most difficult for him. In the following years, he was often torn between standing, but low-budget ribbons and second-rate fighters, in which he often took part for commercial reasons: the 1969 adventure drama "Death on the Krakatau Volcano", the sports melodrama "Players" (1979). After “The Stubborn Saint” (1962), the role in the “Hermit of Altona” followed. For Maximilian Shell, the most successful film was the robbery "Topkapi" (1964). Fees for the detective Case of the Suicide (1966), the adventure film Simon Bolivar (1969) and other projects helped him pay bills for his own productions.
In the late 60s, he turned to producer and directorial work. The historical melodrama "First Love", released on the screens in 1970, received worldwide recognition. Then there were the dramas Pedestrian (1974) and The Judge and the Executioner (1975), the documentary project Marlene (1984). According to him, by 1970, he felt that he was able to "start again" after receiving the Oscar.
In 1975, he played a significant role in the drama Man in a Glass Booth, portraying a wealthy New Yorker kidnapped and brought to Israel for trial. This earned him an Oscar nomination, as did his role in Julia, the 1977 film.
Over the next decades, Maximilian Shell worked in Europe and America, where he starred in the fantastic action movie Black Hole (1979) and the television version of The Phantom of the Opera (1983). Together with his future wife Natalya Andreichenko, he appeared in the mini-series Peter the Great (1986). In the 1990s, he had many screen works: The Beginner, the series Young Catherine, Miss Rose White and Stalin, the adventure melodrama Captive of the Sands, the crime drama Little Odessa, and the melodrama Singing in blackthorn, Eighteenth Angel, Vampires, Clash with the Abyss, historical drama Joan of Arc.
In the 2000s, Maximilian Shell continued his career mainly on television. He appeared in the films “I Love You Baby”, “The Lark Song”, as well as in “Memorable Journey” and the comedy “Brothers Bloom”, the thrillers “Black Flowers” and “Darkness”. The last project in his acting career was the detective "Robbers", which was released in 2015.
