Minetti, Bernhard

(1905-1998)

   Actor. Minetti was born to a family of Italian immigrants, and he intended initially to study theater history in Munich. He became one of Berlin's most outstanding actors by age 25, however, beginning at the State Theater and remaining there until 1944. He appeared in many of Jürgen Fehling's productions at the State Theater, most notably with Werner Krauss and Gustaf Gründgens in plays by William Shakespeare. Because of those associations, Minetti was often accused of being a Nazi sympathizer—accusations he was not always able to refute. In the postwar period, he returned to his native Kiel and proceeded to work in numerous locales until he returned to Berlin in the early 1960s. At the Schiller Theater in Berlin, he remained a member of the company until the theater closed 30 years later for financial reasons after reunification. In the meantime, he worked with several of the emerging new directors in the 1970s, and in 1975 Thomas Bernhard wrote a play especially for and about him, titled (appropriately enough) Minetti. In the 1980s Minetti was the recipient of numerous prizes and citations. He received Theater Rente's "actor of the year" award seven times.