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One of the iconic faces of cinema that tells us about the Second World War and Nazism. A versatile actor with an uncommon talent that also led him to establish himself as a respected director and successful musician. And in the beginning, art was not supposed to be his profession. Yet Maximilian Schell quickly showed his great talent.
An unforgettable face
One of the iconic faces of cinema that tells us about the Second World War and Nazism. A versatile actor, to say the least, with an uncommon talent that over time has also led him to establish himself as a respected director and successful musician. And in the beginning, art was not supposed to be his profession. Yet a personality like Maximilian Schell didn’t take long to emerge and show his talent.
Born in Vienna the 8th of December 1930, Maximilian Schell was, however, already a “child of art”. His mother, Margarethe von Nordberg, was an actress and acting teacher, while his father Hermann Ferdinand owned a pharmacy and, at the same time, dabbled in poetry and playwriting. Yet he, initially, was the one who wanted his son to pursue a career away from the art world, as he believed that no one would be truly happy in life that way. And to think that not only Maximilian, but even all his four children (Carl, Immaculata and the more famous Maria) would become actors.
Young Maximilian, however, began acting on stage in Vienna at the age of three, but, together with his family, in 1938, following the Anschluss, he had to leave his hometown and take refuge in Switzerland – his father’s country – and, specifically, in Zurich. A dynamic but also rather meditative character, Maximilian Schell often devoted himself to reading, often in a small family estate where his father and uncle used to go to hunt deer.
So, before devoting himself exclusively to his acting career, young Maximilian first enrolled at the University of Zurich, then moved to Munich and Basel, studying philosophy and art history and only interrupting his studies for a year due to military service.
It was not long, however, before his official film debut. After beginning a promising career in theatre at the Basel Theatre, Maximilian Schell got his first film role in the feature film Children, Mother, and the General (Laszlo Bnedek, 1955). A work, this one, in which Schell, in the role of a disillusioned deserter, tried his hand for the first time at what would become his “trademark”, namely a role for which he would often be cast by directors and producers all over the world and which would make him one of the symbolic faces of a cinema about Nazi or post-Nazi Germany. This film was followed by many other works such as Counterpoint (Ralph Nelson, 1967), The Odessa File (Ronald Neame, 1974), The Man in the Glass Booth (Arthur Hiller, 1975) and, last but not least, Julia, directed by his countryman Fred Zinnemann in 1977.
Although these films contributed to establishing a certain reputation for Maximilian Schell, even more significant for his career was the feature film Judgment at Nuremberg, directed in 1961 by Stenley Kramer, in which Schell played the role of a lawyer defending Nazi judges and for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, becoming the first German-speaking actor ever to win this important award. On this occasion, many praised his performance, both among his colleagues and in the press, but the greatest gratification for Maximilian Schell was receiving a letter from his older sister Maria, already an established actress many years before him (with whom he always had a very close relationship), who could not help but acknowledge his undoubted talent.
Yet, being a versatile and multitalented actor, Schell did not only try his hand at the above-mentioned roles, but, on the contrary, dabbled in numerous other acting ventures over the years, including the role of a museum treasure thief (in Topkapi, directed by Jules Dassin in 1964), the role of a starship captain in The black Hole (directed by Gary Nelson in 1979), the role of a cardinal in Vampires, directed by John Carpenter in 1998, and the role of Vladimir Lenin in the TV series Stalin (Ivan Passer, 1992).
A passion for cinema, his, which soon led him to also want to get involved behind the camera. And although his directorial work includes First Love (1970), End of the Game (1975) or what is considered his most important film, the Austrian production Tales from the Vienna Woods (1979), his documentaries are equally important, including the controversial Marlene – made in 1984 and focusing on the figure of Marlene Dietrich, who, after an initial approval, later refused to take part in this project, which was nevertheless completed by partly obscuring the images of the actress – and the much more personal My Sister Maria, directed in 2002 and centred on the figure of Maximilian’s sister Maria Schell, who would die only three years later.
And if, therefore, many people already acknowledge Schell’s great talent in the sphere of the Seventh Art, few will know that the Austrian actor was also an outstanding pianist and conductor, although he only devoted his free or relaxing moments to these activities, except for sporadic operas in which he took part directly in the staging, such as Richard Wagner’s Lohengrin (which took place at the Los Angeles Opera) and the film project staging Beethoven’s Fidelio, with Placido Domingo and Kent Nagaro. His talent in music, however, was noticed by many, including Leonard Bernstein and Claudio Abbado, who had the opportunity to work personally with him.
Maximilian Schell’s personality could not go unnoticed and his worldwide success was more than deserved, proving that his good looks (which led him to numerous relationships and two marriages throughout his life, the last of which took place in 2013, a few months after his death from pneumonia) was not the only factor that made directors and producers all over the world notice him. Nowadays, he is therefore remembered as one of the many great talents from Austria who managed to make their mark on history and become immortal.