Frank Beyer

Frank Beyer
Frank Beyer 5 October 1963
Born	Frank Paul Beyer (1932-05-26)26 May 1932 Nobitz, Germany
Died	1 October 2006(2006-10-01) (aged 74) Berlin
Occupation	Film director
Years active	1957–2000

Frank Paul Beyer (26 May 1932 – 1 October 2006) was a German film director. In East Germany he was one of the most important film directors, working for the state film monopoly DEFA and directed films that dealt mostly with the Nazi era and contemporary East Germany. His film Trace of Stones was banned for 20 years in 1966 by the ruling SED. His 1975 film Jacob the Liar was the only East German film ever nominated for an Academy Award. After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 until his death he mostly directed television films.

Frank Beyer was born as Frank Paul Beyer in Nobitz in Thuringia, Germany, to Paul Beyer, a clerk, and Charlotte Beyer, a sales clerk. He had a brother, Hermann Beyer (born 30 May 1943) who should have become a successful actor. After the Machtergreifung of the Nazi Party in 1933 his father, a social democrat lost his job and was unemployed for several years. In 1942 he was drafted for military service and was killed one year later at the Eastern Front.

In 1938 Frank Beyer started attending primary school in Nobitz, and later the Realgymnasium Ernestinum in Altenburg. His education was interrupted for a few months in the aftermath of World War II. In fall 1946 he continued his education in Altenburg and played in an amateur dramatic society. He also became a member of the Free German Youth and later of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany. After finishing school with his Abitur in 1950 he wanted to study history at the University of Leipzig, but at the request of the socialist unity party he stayed in Altenburg and worked as district party secretary for the local cultural association. At the same time he trained to become a film projectionist, and being interested in theater wrote play reviews for the local newspaper. Later he worked at the theater of the towns of Crimmitschau and Glauchau as an assistant director and dramaturge.