Buddy Elias

File:Buddy Elias 2012.jpg

Buddy Elias on a reading in the Anne Frank Zentrum in Berlin 2012

Bernhard Paul "Buddy" Elias (2 June 1925 – 16 March 2015) was a Swiss actor and president of the Anne Frank Fonds.

Elias was born in Frankfurt am Main in Germany in 1925. His father, Erich Elias, became head of the Basel-based Opekta company in 1929 and Bernhard moved there in 1931. In 1947 he joined Holiday on Ice and was with them for over ten years and later acted on stage in Switzerland, Great Britain, France, and Germany. In the mid-1970s, he appeared increasingly in film and television, mainly in Holocaust-themed productions.

Elias was the first cousin and last surviving close relative of Holocaust diarist Anne Frank, who died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in March 1945. He was president of the Anne Frank Fonds, located in Basel. The Anne Frank Fonds is responsible for the rights of Franks' Diary of a Young Girl, which until his death in 1980 had been headed by her father, Otto Frank.

Elias lived in Basel with his wife, Gerti Elias (nee Wiedner), where he died on 16 March 2015. They had two sons, Patrick and Oliver, who became actors.

Filmography

• 1979: Drei Damen vom Grill (TV-series)
• 1979: David, Director Peter Lilienthal
• 1979: The Magician of Lublin, Director Menahem Golan
• 1981: Wie der Mond über Feuer und Blut, Director Axel Corti
• 1981: Charlotte, Director Frans Weisz
• 1982: The Magic Mountain, Director Hans W. Geissendörfer
• 1982: Kassettenliebe, Director Rolf Lyssy
• 1983: Das Traumschiff, Director Alfred Vohrer (TV-series)
• 1987: Die Schwarzwaldklinik, Director Hans-Jürgen Tögel (TV-series)
• 1987: Peng! Du bist tot!, Director Adolf Winkelmann
• 1989–1992: Mit Leib und Seele (ZDF TV-series)
• 1990: Die Frosch-Intrige, Director Hartmut Griesmayr
• 1991: Bronsteins Kinder, Director Jerzy Kawalerowicz
• 1993: Wolffs Revier, Director Michael Lähn
• 1995: Mutters Courage, Director Michael Verhoeven
• 1998: Totalschaden
• 1999: St. Angela, Director Egon Monk (TV-series)
• 1999: Tatort (part Bienzle und die lange Wut), Director Hartmut Griesmayr (TV-series)
• 2002: Edel & Starck (part Das Soufflé der Götter)
• 2004: Bella Block (part Hinter den Spiegeln), Director: Thorsten Näter
• 2004: Was nützt die Liebe in Gedanken, Director Achim von Borries
• 2006: Alles Atze (part Die Rückkehr des Lehrers), Director: Martin Przyborowski
• 2009: Hunkeler und der Fall Livius, Director Stefan Jäger, Markus Fischer
• 2014: The Monuments Men, Director George Clooney

Audioplays

• Die Abenteuer des Odysseus. Buch Jürgen Knop, Director Ulli Herzog, 1982.
• Hugo Rendler: Finkbeiners Geburtstag. Radio-Tatort, SWR 2010.
• Bibi Blocksberg: Ein verhexter Urlaub
• Benjamin Blümchen as Rudi Rundleder.

Awards

• 2012: Ehrenplakette der Stadt Frankfurt am Main (Medal of Honour of the City Frankfurt am Main)
• 2007: Basler Stern (German)

External links

• Works by or about Buddy Elias in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• Buddy Elias at the Internet Movie Database
• Buddy Elias at his agency
• „Erinnerungen vom Dachboden“, Interview, Einestages, 28. Februar 2012 (German)
• biography (German)
• Obituaries (German): FAZ, spiegel.de, sueddeutsche.de