Charles Regnier
| Charles Régnier | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born |
Charles Friedrich Antonio Régnier 22 July 1914 Freiburg, Germany |
| Died | 13 September 2001 (aged 87) Bad Wiessee, Germany |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | 1949–2000 |
| Spouse(s) | Pamela Wedekind (1941–1986) (her death) Sonja Ziemann (1989–2001) (his death) |
Karl Friedrich Anton Hermann 'Charles' Regnier (22 July 1914 – 13 September 2001) was a German actor, director, radio actor and translator. (Some sources inaccurately place Regnier's birth year as 1915.) He appeared in more than 135 films between 1949 and 2000. In the 1950s and 1960s, he was one of the busiest German theatre and film actors. His idiosyncratic, decidedly intellectual style and his sometimes slightly mocking and distant style became his trademark and made him a much sought-after character actor.
Regnier owed his name to his grandfather, a native Frenchman. Regnier was the first child of Anton Karl Regnier and Emile (Milly) Maria Friederike Harrer, born in Freiburg im Breisgau. His father was a general practitioner and Charles initially wished to become a doctor. It was his dream like his childhood idol, Albert Schweitzer, to travel the world and help people.
Charles Regnier grew up in Strasbourg and Badenweiler where his maternal grandparents owned the Schloss Hausbaden hotel. After his father's suicide in 1924, his mother moved with her four sons first to Heidelberg, and then to Montreux on Lake Geneva. When his mother contracted tuberculosis in 1929, the family decided to move to the sanatorium at Davos. Here, Charles met a number of celebrities, including the writer Alfred Henschke alias Klabund, who awakened Regnier's interest in literature and the theatre. Together with his brothers, Charles produced Klabund's comedy XYZ: For three actors in three acts for a performance in Klabund's private living room. His first acting performance was starring as the Countess Y in this piece. "As an actor I never again had the opportunity to play a lady, but often showed how one plays a lady," Regnier wrote in his personal memoirs.
Regnier's first engagement was in 1938 at the theatre at Greifswald. Here he met actress and singer Pamela Wedekind, a daughter of the playwright Frank Wedekind. They married on June 21, 1941 in Berlin. In 1941, Regnier was invited by Otto Falckenberg to join the ensemble of the Munich Kammerspiele, where he remained until 1958. From 1946, Regnier worked as a drama teacher at the newly founded Otto-Falckenberg-Schule.
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