Helmut Berger
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
"And indeed the popularity among young Japanese girls of late Visconti films, Helmut Berger and the extravagant posturing of David Bowie, does seem to point to a taste for the Teutonic bizarre." --A Japanese Mirror: Heroes and Villains of Japanese Culture (1984) by Ian Buruma |
Related e |
Featured: |
Helmut Berger (1944 – 2023) was an Austrian actor, known for his portrayal of narcissistic and sexually ambiguous characters. He was one of the stars of European cinema in the late 1960s and 1970s, and is regarded as a sex symbol and pop icon of that period.
He was both an emblem of high culture in Visconti's The Damned and of low culture in Salon Kitty by Tinto Brass.
Personal life
Berger was openly bisexual. He was in relationships with his director and mentor Luchino Visconti and actress Marisa Berenson. Berger married Italian writer and model Francesca Guidato on 19 November 1994. After 2010 they lived separately. Berger lived for many years in Rome, but returned to Salzburg in the 2000s to take care of his elderly mother.
In the late 1960s and 1970s, Berger was seen as the "it boy of the European jet set". According to his 1998 autobiography Ich. Die Autobiographie, the actor's affairs included flings with Rudolf Nureyev, Britt Ekland, Ursula Andress, Nathalie Delon, Tab Hunter, Florinda Bolkan, Linda Blair, Marisa Mell, Anita Pallenberg, Marilù Tolo, Jerry Hall, and both Bianca and Mick Jagger. Miguel Bosé writes about his affair with Berger in his autobiography.
From the 1980s, Berger's private life was also in the news for his struggles with alcohol and drugs, sometimes resulting in eccentric and controversial television appearances.
Filmography
(director in parentheses; all films except as noted)
- 1967: Le streghe (The Witches) (Luchino Visconti) as Young man at Hotel (segment "La Strega Bruciata Viva")
- 1968: Template:Ill (Antonio Leonviola) as Dario
- 1969: Template:Ill (Maurizio Liverani) as Aldo
- 1969: The Damned (Luchino Visconti) as Martin Von Essenbeck
- 1970: Dorian Gray (Massimo Dallamano) as Dorian Gray
- 1970: The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (Vittorio De Sica) as Alberto
- 1971: Un beau monstre (Sergio Gobbi) as Alain Revent
- 1971: The Bloodstained Butterfly (Duccio Tessari) as Giorgio
- 1972: La colonna infame (Nelo Risi) as Arconati
- 1973: Template:Ill (Otto Schenk) as Der Junge Herr / The Youngman / Alfred
- 1973: Template:Ill (Sergio Gobbi) as Kosta
- 1973: Ludwig (Luchino Visconti) as Ludwig
- 1973: Ash Wednesday (Larry Peerce) as Erich
- 1974: Conversation Piece (Luchino Visconti) as Konrad Huebel
- 1975: Order to Kill (José G. Maesso) as Clyde Hart
- 1975: The Romantic Englishwoman (Joseph Losey) as Thomas
- 1976: Salon Kitty (Tinto Brass) as Helmut Wallenberg
- 1976: Victory at Entebbe (Marvin Chomsky) as Wilfried Böse
- 1977: Beast with a Gun (Sergio Grieco) as Nanni Vitali
- 1977: Paperback
- 1978: The Greatest Battle (Umberto Lenzi) as Lt. Kurt Zimmer
- 1978: The Fifth Commandment (Duccio Tessari) as Bernhard Redder
- 1979: Le rose di Danzica (Alberto Bevilacqua) as Baron Erich von Lehner
- 1980: Template:Ill (Claude Chabrol, Juan Luis Buñuel) (TV miniseries) as Fantômas / Nanteuil / Gurn / Valgrand
- 1980: Eroina (Massimo Pirri) as Marco
- 1981: Mia moglie è una strega (Castellano & Pipolo) as Asmodeo
- 1982: Template:Interlanguage link multi (Károly Makk) as Boris
- 1983: Femmes (Tana Kaleya) as Helmut
- 1983: Veliki Transport (V. Bulajic) as Colonel Glassendorf
- 1982: Victoria! La gran aventura de un poble (Antoni Ribas) as Tinent Rodríguez Haro
- 1983: Victoria! 2: El frenesì del 17 (Antoni Ribas) as Tinent Rodríguez Haro
- 1983–1984: Dynasty (television series) as Peter De Vilbis
- 1984: Victoria! 3: La razon y el arrebato (Antoni Ribas) as Tinent Rodríguez Haro
- 1985: Code Name: Emerald (Jonathan Sanger) as Ernst Ritter
- 1988: Faceless (Jess Franco) as Docteur Flamand
- 1988: Act of Revenge (Salvatore Nocita)
- 1989: La Puritana (Nini Grassia) as Carlo Martora-Doctor
- 1990: The Godfather Part III (Francis Ford Coppola) as Frederick Keinszig
- 1992: Adelaide (Lucio Gaudino) as Gilas
- 1993: Boomtown (Christoph Schrewe) as Richard Schwarzer
- 1993: Ludwig 1881 (F. Dubini / D. Dubini) as King Ludwig II
- 1995: L'affaire Dreyfuss (Yves Boisset) as Schwartzkoppen
- 1996: L'ombra del faraone (S. Ben Barka)
- 1996: Teo (Cinzia TH Torrini) as Signor Mastrovito
- 1997: Template:Ill (Christoph Schlingensief) as Himself
- 1997: Last Cut (Marcello Avallone)
- 1999: Under the Palms (M. Kruishoop) as David
- 2004: Honey Baby (Mika Kaurismäki) as Karl / Hades
- 2005: Damals warst du still (R. Matsutani) as Fabian Plessen
- 2009: Zapping Alien (V. Zeplichal) as Jack / 00Y / Georg II
- 2009: Blutsfreundschaft (Peter Kern) as Gustav Tritzinsky
- 2009: Iron Cross (Joshua Newton) as Shrager / Vogler
- 2011: Mörderschwestern (Peter Kern) as Dr. Schleier
- 2013: The Devil's Violinist (Bernard Rose) as Lord Burghersh
- 2014: Saint Laurent (Bertrand Bonello) as Yves Saint Laurent en 1989
- 2015: Helmut Berger, Actor (Andreas Horvath), documentary film as himself
- 2016: Timeless (Alexander Tuschinski) as Professor Martin
- 2019: Helmut Berger, meine Mutter und ich (Valesca Peters), documentary film as himself
- 2019: Freedom (Albert Serra) as Baron von Walchern