Horst Buchholz was a German actor who appeared in more than 60 feature films from 1951 to 2002. He was sometimes called “the German James Dean” because of his youthful good looks and rebellious roles. He is perhaps best known in English-speaking countries for his role as Chico in The Magnificent Seven (1960), as a communist in Billy Wilder’s One, Two, Three (1961), and as Dr. Lessing in Life Is Beautiful (1997).
Early Life and Career
Horst Buchholz was born in Berlin, the son of Maria Hasenkamp. He never knew his biological father, but took the surname of his stepfather Hugo Buchholz, a shoemaker, whom his mother married in 1938. His half-sister Heidi, born in 1941, gave him the nickname Hotte, which he kept for the rest of his life.
During World War II, he was evacuated to Silesia, and at the end of the war, he found himself in a foster home in Czechoslovakia. He returned to Berlin as soon as he could. He barely finished his schooling before seeking theater work, first appearing on stage in 1949. He established himself in the theater, notably the Schiller Theater, and on radio.
He expanded into film work by doing foreign-language voice dubbing, for example Lampwick in Pinocchio and Ben Cooper in Johnny Guitar. In 1951 he started getting small, uncredited on-screen parts in films like Warum? and Adventure in Berlin.
Full-fledged stardom resulted from Confessions of Felix Krull (1957), in which he played the lead of a narcissistic high-class conman; it was directed by Kurt Hoffmann and based on the novel by Thomas Mann.
He also starred in several English-language films, such as Fanny (1961), Nine Hours to Rama (1963), Cervantes (1967), and The Bridge at Remagen (1969). He worked with renowned directors such as Billy Wilder, Jules Dassin, Blake Edwards, and Roberto Benigni.
Death and Legacy
Buchholz died unexpectedly at the age of sixty-nine in the Berlin Charité from pneumonia that developed after an operation for a hip fracture. According to The Celebrity Deaths, he was recovering from a broken thighbone when he died in intensive care at the Charite hospital on March 3, 2003.
He was survived by his wife Myriam Bru, a French movie actress whom he married in 1958, and their two children: Christopher Buchholz, also an actor and film director, and Beatrice Buchholz, an artist and sculptor.
His gravestone in Berlin bears the word “actor” below his name and the phrase “Love the world and the world will love you” below his birth and death dates.
Buchholz is remembered as one of the most popular and versatile actors of his generation. He received several awards and honors for his work, including the Bambi Award, the Golden Globe Award, the David di Donatello Award, and the German Film Award. He also has a star on the Boulevard der Stars in Berlin.
