Alexander Kolowrat
Alexander Kolowrat | |
---|---|
Born | Alexander Joseph Graf Kolowrat-Krakowsky 29 January 1886 |
Died | 4 December 1927 | (aged 41)
Occupation | Film producer |
Years active | 1909–1927 |
Count Alexander "Sascha" Joseph von Kolowrat-Krakowsky (29 January 1886 – 4 December 1927) was an Austrian film producer of Bohemian-Czech descent from the House of Kolowrat. A pioneer of Austrian cinema, he founded the first major film studio Sascha-Film in Vienna.
Life
He was born in what is now Glen Ridge, New Jersey,[1] which was then part of the now-neighboring town of Bloomfield. He was the son of Count Leopold Filip Kolowrat-Krakowsky (1852–1910) and his wife Nadine Freiin von Huppmann-Valbella (1858–1942), the daughter of a successful cigarette manufacturer from Saint Petersburg. He had three siblings: Bertha, Friedrich and Heinrich.
The reason "Sascha" Kolowrat-Krakowsky was born in the US is described in a letter of March 30, 1984, from his nephew Count
Due to a supposed or actual 'defamation' of his bride, my grandfather [Leopold] shot his adversary, a
Prince of Auersperg, in a duel, which had to be atoned for by an exile of several years, according to the customs of that time. This Old Austrian, very Schnitzler-like drama could have provided his son [Sascha] with a good film subject.[2]
After Count Leopold Kolowrat had been granted a reprieve by Emperor
After the death of his father in 1910 and the inheritance of his estates in Bohemia, Alexander Kolowrat founded the Sascha-Film factory and a film laboratory at his castle Groß Meierhöfen (today Velké Dvorce) in Pfraumberg (Přimda). In 1912, he moved to Vienna and founded the Sascha-Filmfabrik on Pappenheimgasse 2/Treustraße in Brigittenau. One of his first productions with Sascha-Film was the documentary Die Gewinnung des Erzes am steirischen Erzberg in Eisenerz ("The Ore Mining in the Styrian Erzberg in Eisenerz"). In 1915, he took over the film branch of the k.u.k. Kriegspressequartier (War Media Quarters) in Vienna and also produced several propaganda movies during World War I.
Kolowrat-Krakowsky worked with many actors, e.g. the then-obscure
The count owned a large city palace on Wenceslas Square in Prague. An enthusiastic mobilist he financed the development of a lightweight sports car ("Sascha-Wagen") designed by the Austro-Daimler engineer Ferdinand Porsche, which ran at the 1922 Targa Florio with Alfred Neubauer at the wheel.
Kolowrat died of cancer in 1927 in Vienna, aged 41. He would be referenced in the hit Dietrich-von Sternberg film collaboration Dishonored (1931), in which Marlene Dietrich plays a spy whose civilian name is Marie Kolowrat.
Filmography
- Die Gewinnung des Eisens am steirischen Erzberg in Eisenerz (1912)
- Der Millionenonkel (directed by Hubert Marischka, 1913)
- Wien im Krieg (propaganda film, 1916)
- Martyr of His Heart (1918)
- The Other I (1918)
- Eine versunkene Welt (1920)
- Gypsy Love (1922)
- Sodom und Gomorrha (directed by Michael Curtiz, 1922)
- Young Medardus (directed by Michael Curtiz, 1923)
- Children of the Revolution (1923)
- Miss Madame (1923)
- Die Sklavenkönigin(directed by Michael Curtiz, 1924)
- Das Spielzeug von Paris (directed by Michael Curtiz, 1925)
- Salammbô (co-production with Gaumont, 1925)
- Café Elektric (directed by Gustav Ucicky, 1927)
Literature
- Fritz, W., & Zahradnik, M. (eds.), 1992: Erinnerungen an S. Kolowrat (Schriftenreihe des Österreichischen Filmarchivs31) (in German)
- Hübl, I. M. & S. K., 1950: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der österreichischen Kinematographie (in German)
References
- ^ filmreference.com
- ^ Fritz Walter: Im Kino erlebe ich die Welt. Vienna, 1996, p. 38