Vintage German postcard. Ross Verlag, No. 242, c. 1919. Photo by J. Braae, Berlin. Lya Mara in her outfit for the film Charlotte Corday (Frederic Zelnik, 1919). The costume and bonnet are copied from a portrait of Corday by François-Séraphin Delpech.
Lya Mara (1897-1960?) was one of the biggest stars of the German silent cinema. Her stardom was even the subject of a novel, which was published in 100 episodes between 1927 and 1928. Her career virtually ended after the arrival of sound film.
Tags: Ross Verlag Weimar 1920s German Germany DEutsch Deutschland Vintage Vedette Postcard Postkarte POstale Postkaart Postal Cinema Carte Cartolina Cine cARD Carte Postale Celebrity Costume Film Film Star Movies Movie Star Muet Muto Screen Star Sepia Silent Schauspielerin Stummfilm Darstellerin Ansichtkaart Ansichtskarte ACtress Actrice Attrice Lya Mara Braae J. Braae Charlotte Corday 1919 Frederic Zelnik
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Vintage German postcard. Verlag Hermann Leiser, No. 9538. Photo by Braae, norwegische Foto-Kunst.
Austrian actor Friedrich Zelnik or Frederic Zelnik (1885-1950) was also one of the most important producers-directors of the German silent cinema. Already in the early 1910s he became a film star in Germany, but during the 1920s he had his greatest successes there as director-producer of operetta style costume films starring his wife, Lya Mara. A critical success was his drama Die Weber/The Weaver (1927). After 1933, he worked in Great-Britain and also directed two films in the Netherlands.
Tags: Leiser Hermann Leiser Vintage Postcard Postkarte Postkaart POstale Postal Portrait German Germany DEutsch Deutschland Theatre Theater Cinema Carte Cartolina Cine Card Carte Postale Celebrity Costume Film Film Star Movies Movie Star Muet Muto Screen Star Silent Stummfilm Ansichtkaart Ansichtskarte Actor Acteur Attore SChauspieler Darsteller sepia Wilhelminian 1910s Friedrich Zelnik Frederic Zelnik Braae J. Braae
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Vintage German postcard. Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin, No. 9894. Photo by J. Braae Photokunst. 1917.
Lotte Neumann (1896-1977) was one of the most successful actresses in the early days of the German silent cinema. She also worked as a screenwriter and a producer.
Tags: Leiser Hermann Leiser German Germany DEutsch Deutschland 1910s Vintage Vedette Postcard Postkarte POstale Postkaart Postal Cinema Carte Cartolina Cine Card Carte Postale Celebrity Costume Film Film Star Movies Movie Star Muet Muto Screen Star Silent Stummfilm Ansichtkaart Ansichtskarte Schauspielerin Darstellerin ACtress Actrice Attrice Sepia Lotte Neumann Braae J. Braae
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German postcard by Verlag Hermann Leiser, Berlin-Wilm., no. 403. Photo: Nordische Foto-Kunst Braae.
Lya Mara (1897-1960?) was one of the biggest stars of the German silent cinema. Her stardom was even the subject of a novel, which was published in 100 episodes between 1927 and 1928. Her career virtually ended after the arrival of sound film.
Tags: Leiser Verlag Hermann Leiser German Germany DEutsch Deutschland 1910s Wilhelminian Vintage Vedette Postcard Postkarte POstale Postkaart Postal Picture Cinema Carte Cartolina Cine Card Carte Postale Celebrity Costume Film Film Star Movies Movie Star Muet Muto Screen Star Silent Stummfilm Ansichtkaart Ansichtskarte female ACtress Actrice Attrice Schauspielerin Darstellerin Braae Lya Mara
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German postcard by Rotophot in the Film Sterne series, no. 133/2. Photo: J. Braae.
Edith Meller (1897-1953) was a Hungarian film actress, whose career was in the German silent cinema. She appeared in several films written, directed, and produced by Georg Jacoby, whose first wife she was for a short time.
Edith Meller (also Mèller) was born in 1897 in Budapest, then one of the two capitals of the dual monarchy Austria-Hungary. She was the daughter of a mill owner and spent her childhood and youth in Pressbaum near Vienna. She attended a Viennese theatre school and received her first engagement at the Theater an der Wien. On the mediation of former Austro-Hungarian Foreign Minister Leopold Berchtold's wife, Meller could make her film debut in the pro-Bulgaria propaganda film Bogdan Stimoff (Georg Jacoby, 1916), a German-Austrian-Hungarian coproduction by the Projektions-AG Union (PAGU) Berlin and the Austro-Hungarian cinema industry in Vienna. For this film, made in the middle of the First World War, she called herself Edith Möller. Then she appeared in Benjamin, der Schüchterne/Benjamin, the shy one (William Karfiol, 1916) with Wilhelm Diegelmann. It was followed by roles in such propaganda films as Die Entdeckung Deutschlands/The Discovery of Germany (Georg Jacoby, Richard O. Frankfurter, 1916) and Der feldgraue Groschen/The field-gray penny (Georg Jacoby, 1917). These films were issued to help raise funds in Germany during the First World war. Then followed roles at National Film in films by Georg Victor Mendel and Georg Jacoby, such as Der Antiquar von Straßburg/The Strasbourg antiquarian (Georg Victor Mendel, 1917) with Ludwig Hartau, and the adventure film Indische Rache/Indian revenge (Leo Lasko, Georg Jacoby, 1920) with Harry Liedtke.
In 1921 Edith Meller played the character of Conchita in the serial Der Mann ohne Nahmen/Peter Voss, Thief of Millions (Georg Jacoby, 1921), starring Harry Liedtke as master-thief and globetrotter Peter Voss. The six-part serial, based on the novel 'Peter Voss, Thief of Millions' by Ewald Gerhard Seeliger, was shot at the Tempelhof Studios with extensive location filming taking place in Denmark, Holland, Italy, Spain, Morocco, and Dalmatia. She also appeared in Ernst Lubitsch's classic farce Die Bergkatze/The Wild Cat (1921), starring Pola Negri. Eventually, |Meller married Georg Jacoby in 1922. Meller mostly played supporting parts in the 1920s, such as in Das Paradies im Schnee/Paradise in the Snow (Georg Jacoby, 1923) with Bruno Kastner and Elga Brink in her film debut. The 18-year-old Brink became the new love of Jacoby. Jacoby and Meller divorced and her career soon stagnated. Her last parts, such as in the drama Meineid/Perjury (Georg Jacoby, 1929) with Alice Roberts, Francis Lederer, and Miles Mander, were minor ones. She couldn't act during the Third Reich. According to the Reichsfilmkammer documents, she was considered a so-called fully Jewish woman. In 1936 Edith Meller became the mother of a daughter named Edith in Berlin. According to Wikipedia, when the deportations of Jews in Germany were in full swing, Jacoby and his then-wife Marika Rökk offered Meller refuge in their villa at the Schwarzwald. The couple had bought this from the film producer Alfred Zeisler, who had emigrated to America. However, according to Filmportal.de, she also had a small part in the American film Passage to Marseille (Michael Curtiz, 1944), starring Humphrey Bogart. This indicates she must have been able to flee to the USA. According to Stephanie D'heil at Steffi-line, Meller could not gain a foothold in Hollywood and she returned to Germany after the Second World War. Edith Meller passed away in Berlin in 1953. She was only 56.
Sources: Stephanie D'heil (Steffi-line - German), Filmportal.de, Wikipedia (German and English), and IMDb.
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