Sybille Maria Christina Schmitz (2 December 1909 â€" 13 April 1955)
was a German actress.Schmitz attended an acting school in Cologne and
got her first engagement at Max Reinhardt's Deutsches Theater in
Berlin in 1927. Only one year later, she made her film debut with
Freie Fahrt (1928), which attracted her first attention from the
critics. Her other early movies include Pabst's Diary of a Lost Girl
(1929), Dreyer's Vampyr (1932), and eventually F.P.1 (1932), where she
played her first leading role.Schmitz established herself as a
prominent actress in the German cinema with the films which followed
including Der Herr der Welt (1934), Abschiedswalzer (1934), Ein
idealer Gatte (1935), and Fährmann Maria (1936). She also had roles
in Die Umwege des schönen Karl (1937), Tanz auf dem Vulkan [de]
(1938), Die Frau ohne Vergangenheit (1939), Trenck, der Pandur (1940)
and Titanic (1943). Schmitz's career remained strong even though she
was never sanctioned by the Reichsfilmkammer or ran afoul of Joseph
Goebbels. However, her explicitly non-Aryan appearance relegated her
mostly to femme-fatales or problematic foreign women.After World War
II, Schmitz was shunned by the German film community for continuously
working during the Third Reich, and it became difficult for her to
land roles. She appeared in supporting roles in such movies as
Zwischen gestern und morgen (1947), Sensation in Savoy (1950), and
Illusion in a Minor Key (1952), but was beset with alcoholism, drug
abuse, depression, several suicide attempts and the committal to a
psychiatric clinic. Her self-destructive behavior and numerous affairs
with both men and women further alienated Schmitz from the film
industry and her own husband, screenwriter Harald G. Petersson.
was a German actress.Schmitz attended an acting school in Cologne and
got her first engagement at Max Reinhardt's Deutsches Theater in
Berlin in 1927. Only one year later, she made her film debut with
Freie Fahrt (1928), which attracted her first attention from the
critics. Her other early movies include Pabst's Diary of a Lost Girl
(1929), Dreyer's Vampyr (1932), and eventually F.P.1 (1932), where she
played her first leading role.Schmitz established herself as a
prominent actress in the German cinema with the films which followed
including Der Herr der Welt (1934), Abschiedswalzer (1934), Ein
idealer Gatte (1935), and Fährmann Maria (1936). She also had roles
in Die Umwege des schönen Karl (1937), Tanz auf dem Vulkan [de]
(1938), Die Frau ohne Vergangenheit (1939), Trenck, der Pandur (1940)
and Titanic (1943). Schmitz's career remained strong even though she
was never sanctioned by the Reichsfilmkammer or ran afoul of Joseph
Goebbels. However, her explicitly non-Aryan appearance relegated her
mostly to femme-fatales or problematic foreign women.After World War
II, Schmitz was shunned by the German film community for continuously
working during the Third Reich, and it became difficult for her to
land roles. She appeared in supporting roles in such movies as
Zwischen gestern und morgen (1947), Sensation in Savoy (1950), and
Illusion in a Minor Key (1952), but was beset with alcoholism, drug
abuse, depression, several suicide attempts and the committal to a
psychiatric clinic. Her self-destructive behavior and numerous affairs
with both men and women further alienated Schmitz from the film
industry and her own husband, screenwriter Harald G. Petersson.
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