Polizeiruf actor Wolfgang Winkler is dead
mdr culture
December 8, 2019
The actor Wolfgang Winkler is dead. He died at the age of 76 years after a cancer, as the director of the New Theater Halle, Matthias Brenner, announced. Winkler could look back on a long career as an actor - but it was winding and rocky. Only the police call made him famous since 1996.
Child of Upper Lusatia
Winkler was born in 1943 in Görlitz. He grew up with his grandparents, simple people who regularly went to the theater. After school, he began training as a train driver and founded the cabaret "The purposes" in parallel. It quickly became clear that he felt more at home on the stage than in the railway: Winkler applied to the Filmhochschule Babelsberg as a drama student.
The attempt worked and led first on the road to success: With just 21 years Winkler got his first supporting role, director Kurt Maetzig turned with him "The rabbit I am". But the joy did not last long, the cultural bureaucrats of the SED banned Maetzig's film (only 1989 witnessed the premiere of Winkler) and a little later, even the Filmschool, because he had taken over without permission roles.
Winkler gets his way
The dream of the film career had once burst. Winkler had to rethink: He went to the theater, but did not get there as hoped for a commitment in Berlin, but in Görlitz and Zittau. In 1967 he jumped to the Hallesche Landestheater, also not a big house, but used it in a variety of roles. At the same time, Winkler regularly received small and medium-sized television roles, for example in production of the Moritzburg Television Theater and in the children's film Das Pferdemädchen. But the great fame did not come.
Complex relationship with Peter Sodann
As Intendant Horst Schönemann went to Berlin with his actors, he left Winkler in Halle, again a bitter blow. In 1980, Peter Sodann followed as acting director in Halle, but Winkler had a hard time with the new boss. Finally, he quit in 1986, hoping again for a job at a Berlin theater - but again, nothing came of it. For financial reasons, it moved in the Nachwendewirren back to the "new theater" in Halle, until Schönemann but again announced and offered him Dresden. Winkler became a state actor in the Saxon capital at the age of 50.
A well-rehearsed team: Wolfgang Winkler and Jaecki Schwarz.Image rights: IMAGO
In 1995 the career continued uphill: Winkler joined the SAT1 series "Kurklinik Rosenau". Only a few months later, the supplement for the role of Commissioner Schneider in Police Call 110 followed. A role in which much had always set itself, as Winkler once described it: "He sets the tone, he is always normal, he is never artificial, that's a great art to play like this. "
A total of 50 episodes turned the Jaecki Schwarz / Wolfgang Winkler alias Schmücke / Schneider with the police call 110 from Halle. Over time Winkler was approached on the street with "Schneider". Only one dream never came true: the theater engagement in Berlin.
A total of 50 episodes turned the Jaecki Schwarz / Wolfgang Winkler alias Schmücke / Schneider with the police call 110 from Halle. Over time Winkler was approached on the street with "Schneider". Only one dream never came true: the theater engagement in Berlin.
WINKLER, Wolfgang
Born: 3/2/1943, Görlitz, Saxony, Germany
Died: 12/7/2019, Germany
Wolfgang Winkler’s western – actor:
Karl May (TV) – 1992 (Gevatter Weisspflug)