Biography
1938 |
Rosemarie Magdalena Albach is born on september 23rd, a friday, as the first child of the actors Magda Schneider and Wolf Albach-Retty. The family moves from Wien to Schnau near Berchtesgarden in october. Romy grows up here under the care of her grandmother Maria Schneider while her mother is doing movies and stagework. Her grandmother on her fathers side of the family is the actress Rosa Albach-Retty, who had her 105th birhtday on december 26th, 1979. Her first name Rosemarie was a combination of her fathers grandmothers name Rosa and her mothers grandmothers name Maria. Romy Schneider has the german citizenship. She already had the pet name "Romy" as a child. While looking for work as an actress she was still using the name Rosemarie Albach; in her first movie she was then credited as Rosemarie Schneider-Albach, presumaly a request from her mother, but some critics mistakenly credited her as Rosemarie Albach Schneider. However some publicity articles for this movie mentioned, and thereby started to established, the shortform "Romy". Starting with her second movie "Feuerwerk" she is officially credited as Romy Schneider. |
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| 1941 | Birth of her Brother Wolf-Dietrich (june 21st, "Wolfi"). He later becomes a Surgeon in Zurich. | |
| 1943 | Her parents are seperating. They had been married since the winter of 1936. Her father moves in with the actress Trude Marlen. | |
| 1944 | Romy starts to go to school. | |
| 1949 | After the end of the war Romy switches to the boarding school "Goldenstein", run bei the "Englischen Fräulein". She attends this school for four years (july 1st 1949 - july 12th 1953) up to her 14th birthday. Her parents are finally getting divorced. | |
| 1953 | Romy makes her debut on screen in the movie "When the White Lilacs Bloom Again", alongside her mother. Her debut is successful and she quickly gets cast in her second movie "Feuerwerk" with Lilli Palmer. Magda Schneider marries the caterer Hans Herbert Blatzheim from cologne. |
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| 1954 | Romy is in serious consideration for a supporting role in Arthur Maria Rabenalts Filmproject "The Gypsy Baron", but Waltraud Hass gets the part instead. However Romy gets her first leading role: Director Ernst Marischka casts her as Queen Victoria for his movie "The Story of Vickie". | |
| 1955 | Romy has established herself as part of the german movie industry: after "A March for the Emperor" and "The Last Man" she turns the movieworld upside down with her performance as "Sissi". Daughters, Mothers and Grandmothers all over Europe dream of being her. | |
| 1956 | Romy continues "Sissi's" success with the sequel "Sissi: The Young Empress". People everywhere flock to see the movie, but Romy has a dreadful feeling that she might get typecast following the movies success. To escape this fate she takes two leading roles that are nothing like Sissi: in "Kitty and the Great Big World" and "The Girl and the Legend". | |
| 1957 | Romy is working in Paris for the first time, on Gabor von Vaszarys lovestory "Monpti". Vaszary writes the book "Romy" following their encounter. Later that year Ernst Marishka calls her: he wants Romy to portrait Sissi again; wearing the crown again is inevitable, "Sissi: The Fateful Years of an Empress" gets made. After shooting wraps up she travels to Ischia to star in "Scampolo" | |
| 1958 | After the unfortunate remake "Girls in Uniform", she meets Alain Delon for the first time in the even more unfortunate remake of Schnitzlers "Flirtation", titled "Christine". "Eva" follows, totally alienating her Sissi-Audience. | |
| 1959 | Germany loses Romy Schneider: on may 22nd she gets engaged to french actor Alain Delon. She works on the french-german co-productions "Angel on Earth" and "Die schöne Lügnerin". But even the french can't get Sissi out of their heads: she co-stars with Curd Jürgends in "Magnificent Sinner". During a set visit to Alain Delon's movie "Lust for Evil" she shoots a cameo appearence. | |
| 1960 | Romy returns to Germany following the request of the great Fritz Kortner for the part of Myrrhine in his TV production "Die Sendung der Lysistra". Subsequently she visits Alain Delon on the set of "Rocco and His Brothers" and meets Luchino Visconti. A long-lasting tight relationship follows their encounter, which shakes Romys Life and career dramatically. | |
| 1961 | Visconti persuades Romy, who never had acting lessons, to go on stage for the first time, in a langauge that she is not proficient in. He stages the elizabethan incest-drama "Schade, da sie eine Dirne ist" from John Ford with Romyand Alain. Romy overburdens herself during rehearsals and after an appendix operation the premiere takes place on the 29th of march in Paris. All of Paris raves about it; Critics especially praise Romys Transition to a serious Stageactress. During the theater offs-eason Romy and Visconti work on the episode "The Job" for the movie "Boccaccio '70". Visconti, Coco Chanel and the Coiffeur Alexandre finalize Romys Metamorphosis. Alain Cavaliers "Fire and Ice" co-starring Jean-Lonis Trintignant is produced in november. Afterwards she starts rehearsing with the Compagnie Sacha Pitoff for the role of Nina in Chekhovs "Die Möwe". |
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| 1962 | Romy takes a guest-starring-part in Guy Gilles "Love at Sea" before she starts production on Orson Wells "The Trial". "The Victors", her first production for Columbia, follows. |
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| 1963 | Romy travels overseas for the US-premiere of "Boccaccio '70". Robert Rossen offers her the part of "Lilith", which eventually goes to Jean Seberg. Hollywood-Director Otto Preminer casts her as the female leading-role in "The Cardinal". During shooting in her hometown Vienna she meets her parents, who have reconciled. In june she goes to Paris and receives the award as best foreign actress for her Portrayal of Leni in "The Trial". She moves to Hollywood in autumn and stars with Jack Lemmon in the comedy "Good neighbor Sam". | |
| 1964 | Shooting for "L'Enfer" starts in spring, but has to be aborted because director Henri-Georges Clouzot falls ill. The film remains unfinished; so does her latest project with Visconti. At the end of june she gets the Audience-Award "La Victoire du Cinema Francais", handed to her by Michle Morgan. But her misfortune that year continues: Romy and Alain Delon seperate and during the production of Clive Donners "What's new Pussycat" she almost gets hit by a falling spotlight. | |
| 1965 | Romy moves back to Germany. She takes part in the opening of the Europa-Center, where her Stepfather "Daddy" Blatzheim opens a Pub. She meets the actor and boulevardtheater-director Harry Meyen from Berlin. Even though their theaterproject "Fräulein Julie" never takes form they start a personal relationship. Romy stars in Jules Dassins "10:30 P.M. Summer" alongside Melina Mercouri and Peter Finch in autumn. She passes on the opportunity to play the leading role in Claude Lelouchs "A Man and a Woman". | |
| 1966 | Romy and Michael Piccoli work together for the first time on his movie "Chimney No. 4". Afterwards she collaborates with James Bond-Director Terence Young on "Triple Cross". Hans-Jürgen Syberberg meets Romy for his TV-Documenation "Romy - Potrait of a Face" that he is doing for the "Bayerischen Rundfunk". On june 15th Romy gets married to Harry Meyen in Sant-Jean Cap Ferrat, they move to Berlin-Grunewald and their son David-Christopher is born on december third at 9:06am. Romy draws back into her private life. | |
| 1967 | Wolf Albach-Retty dies on february 21st (28.5.1906 - 21.2.1967). | |
| 1968 | Romy returns to the big screen: She starts shooting the spy-parody "Otley" with Tom Courtenay as her partner, which receives mixed reactions. But her next movie starts feeding the gossip-columns again: she co-stars with her old love Alain Delon in "The Swimming Pool". | |
| 1969 | Critics tear her movie "My Lover My Son" apart. However her encounter with Claude Sautet follows; Romy has found a new collaborator. They starts shooting "The Things of Life" that summer, which turns out to be the smash hit of the next year in France. | |
| 1970 | Romy stars in Maurice Ronet's psycho-thriller "Die Geliebte des Anderen", followed by Richard Harns "Bloomfield" and Ugo Tognazzis "Lady Caliph". She is reunited with Sautet and Piccoli for "Max et les ferrailleurs" and with Alain Delon for "The Assassination of Trotsky" in late-autumn. Romy gets involved in sociopolitics when she, alongside hunderets of other women, admits to the magazine "Stern" that she had an abortion. They demand the abolishment of paragraph 218. | |
| 1971 | Romy meets Visconti at the Cannes Film Festivals and he suggests her to play the role of empress Elisabeth from austria one last time. Romy reluctantly accepts; her last exorcism with Sissi begins. | |
| 1972 | Viscontis directs her alongside Helmut Berger in "Ludwig". The final uncut version wont be seen in germany for 7 years. Claude Sautet casts Romy for their third picture together, the movie "César and Rosalie". Romy seperates from Harry Meyen (they get divorced in the june of 1975). | |
| 1973 | After an extended stay in swiss she returns to the screen in the summer for "The Train". Romy takes on several projects: "Loving in the Rain" directed by Jean-Claude Brialy, "Le mouton enragé" by Michel Deville and Francis Girods "The Infernal Trio". | |
| 1974 | After her shocking role in "The Infernal Trio" she takes on a part in Andrezej Zulwaski's "L'important c'est d'aimer" which is simultaneously going to thrill and unsettle her fans. The following part in her first collaboration with Claude Chabrol in "Dirty Hands" turns out to be challenging; she feels abandoned by her director. | |
| 1975 | Romy is starring with Philippe Noiret in Rbert Enrico's "The Old Gun", her most successful movie in France to date. She receives the Audience Award du Cinema and is awarded as best actress at the Festival in Taormina. On december 18th she marries her assisstant Daniel Biasini. |
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| 1976 | The readers of the magazine Ciné-Revue award her the Grand Prix International. On april 3rd she receives the french equivalent of the Oscar, a Caesar, for her performance in "L'important c'est d'aimer". |
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| 1977 | Romy receives a golden filmstrip from the german Movieawards for her role as Leni in "Group Portrait with a Lady". On july 21st her daughter Sarah is born in St. Tropez. Romy drops out of "Lulu" because of creative differences with Director Liliana Cavani. The movie gets made two years later starring Anne Bennent. |
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| 1978 | Her fifth collaboration with her favorite director Claude Sautet, "A Simple Story", gets made. Romy stars in the international big budget production "Bloodline" from director Terence Young. | |
| 1979 | Romys first husband Harry Meyen commits suicide in Hamburg on april 15th. She receives her second caesar, this time for Claude Sautet's "A Simple Story". During spring she is cast by director Costa-Gavras for the first time, for his romantic movie "Womanlight", co-starring Yves Montand. "Death Watch" follows, which is entered into the 30th international Berlin Film Festivals as official contribution from France. |
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| 1980 | Francis Girod directs Romy in "The Woman Banker". "Fantasma d'amore" follows, directed by Dino Risi. The readers of "Paris Match" vote Romy Schneider and Alain Delon as their favorite stars of the year. |
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| 1981 | Romy takes a small part in "Under Suspicion", starring Lino Ventura and Michel Serrault, by director Claude Miller. She enters the gossip columns when she divorces Daniel Biasini. The production on "The Passerby" have to be interrupted because of a broken leg. Shooting continues briefly in may before a kidney-operation forces Romy to suspend production again. On july 5th her son Daniel has a fatal accident. He slips while climbing Biasinis grandparents fence, impales himself and dies in the hospital. He was only 14 years old. Production on "The Passerby" finally continue in october and wrap up in december. |
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| 1982 | The trademagazine "Le Cinema Francais" announces that the production for Romys next movie "Einer gegen den anderen" will begin on july 1st, co-starring Alain Delon and directed by Pierre Granier-Deferre. However the movie will never be made with Romy. On may 29th Romy Schneider dies of heart failure in the morning hours, 10 months and 24 days after the death of her son David. "The Passerby", the first project that she initiated herself, becomes her parting gift. She dedicated the movie to "David and his Father". She receives the Award as best leading actress for her last movie posthumously from the Film Festival in Montreal. |
