Walter Bruno Iltz (17 November 18865 November 1965) was a German stage actor, drama producer and theatre manager.
Life Provenance and early years Walter Bruno Iltz was born at Praust (as Pruszcz was known) before 1945), a small manufacturing town just outside Danzig/Gdańsk. In 1907, as he set off the study Chemistry at Munich, he seemed to be destined to follow his father's example and make his way in life as a pharmacistDeutsches Bühnen-Jahrbuch. Spielzeit 1966/67. Genossenschaft Deutscher Bühnen-Angehörigen, Deutscher Bühnenverein, F. A. Günther & Sohn, Hamburg 1967 but by 1908 he had become an actor. His first recorded stage appearance took place that year at Schweidnitz in Silesia. Stage roles at the City Theatre in Zittau followed in 1909: that was followed by a longer period as a member of the company at the Lobe Theatre in Breslau/Wrocław between 1910 and 1913.Stadtarchiv Düsseldorf, V 71568 There were probably also stage appearances at Detmold during this time. Sources differ as to the precise chronology of his early years as a theatre actor, however.
Dresden Iltz worked between 1913 and 1924 at Dresden's newly built Royal Playhouse, and was still there when, several years after the abdications of the King of Saxony and the German emperor, it was renamed State Playhouse (Staatsschauspiel) for a new republican age. During his first few years at Dresden the Playhouse was under the direction of Karl Zeiss. Iltz built his skills and his reputation as a youthful character actor, while a member of a theatre company that also included Maria Fein and Theodor Becker (who shortly afterwards became a husband and wife partnership). During his years at the State Playhouse, Iltz was also increasingly involved as a producer-director, but there was never any abrupt switch from acting to directing: his public reputation, even when he moved on from Dresden in 1924, was still principally as an actor. He won particular plaudit for the qualities of his speech, for instance when took the title role in Hofmannsthal's "Everyman", that of "Franz Moor" in Schiller's The Robbers, as "Ferdinand" in Intrigue and Love (also by Schiller) and in the title role of Hanns Johst's "The King". In 1920 Iltz appeared in the world premiere production of Walter Hasenclever's expressionist drama "Jenseits" ("Beyond"), under the direction of Berthold Viertel and co-starring with Emanuel Raul and Alice Verden. The Dresden production of the play, intended to "invent a new dimension and language on stage", resonated strongly with audiences and critics. The production was subsequently toured, first to the Landestheater in Stuttgart and then, in 1922, to the Lobe Theatre in Breslau, where Iltz had been a member of the company before the war. Iltz had by this time acquired a high profile as a stage presence in the theatre world. Max Brod dedicated his one-act drama (The Height of Feeling) – written in 1911 and published in 1913 but premiered only in 1918, at Dresden – to Iltz, whom the playwright described as "the outstanding presenter of [the star role of] Orosmin". During and after 1921, influenced by the work of Max Reinhardt, Iltz became ever more engaged with his stage directing work at the Dresden Playhouse. According to one contemporary he came across, at this time, as "youthful, fresh, energetic, determined, with rather a boyish manner".Oskar Walzel: Wachstum und Wandel. Lebenserinnerungen. Erich Schmidt Verlag, Berlin 1956 Some fellow thespians were more than bemused by his "dictatorial approach", and the trades union congress even referenced his "anti-social conduct". He was nevertheless very successful in terms of results.
Helena Forti (1884–1942) was a stage soprano who arrived at the Semperoper in Dresden in 1911, a couple of years before Iltz moved to the Royal Playhouse across the river. Walter Bruno Iltz married Helena Forti in 1917. Forti remained a member of the opera company in Dresden from 1911 till 1924, but she also appeared at other prestigious venues. On 1914 she appeared as Sieglinde in Walküre and as Kundry in Parsifal at the Bayreuth Festival. Through Helena's work at Bayreuth the couple came to know Siegfried and Winifred Wagner. In 1916 Walter Iltz's wife sang the lead role of "Myrtocle" in the premiere performance of Eugen d'Albert's Die toten Augen. In 1924, however, having reached the age of 40, she retired from her performing career and worked in support of her husband's, training performers in stage acting technique behind the scenes at Gera and Düsseldorf where, between 1924 and 1937, he was employed as a Theatre Director.
Gera In 1924 Iltz took over as General Intendant (Theatre Director) at the Princely Reuß Theatre in Gera. The Reuß Theatre enjoyed a unique status during the republican years, benefitting from the protective and enthusiastic support of Prince Heinrich XLV of Reuß, to whom Iltz assigned various dramaturgist responsibilities. For these the prince was well equipped by virtue of his broad literary knowledge. The theatre was neither supported nor encumbered by municipal or state funding, but it nevertheless managed to avoid becoming an island of rich privilege.Ulrich Bubrowski (Hrsg.): Ernst Barlachs Drama "Der Arme Vetter". Aufnahme, Kritik. Wirkung. Piper, München 1988 The auditorium had space for 1,100 and the recently renovated building was suitable for plays, stage shows, operas and operettas.
Iltz became known as a youthful modernising theatre director, open minded and enthusiastic. During his three seasons at Gera he incorporated many new dramatists into the theatre calendar. One was Ernst Barlach. Iltz himself staged Barlach's "" (1925) and "" (1927). There was an early production of Brecht's Man Equals Man. Other relatively youthful playwrights featured were Arnolt Bronnen, Walter Hasenclever, Georg Kaiser Carl Zuckmayer and Fritz von Unruh. Many plays had their world premieres at Gera under Iltz's direction. These included works by Alexander Lernet-Holenia ("Saul"), André Gide ("The prodigal's return"), Diderot ("Est-il Bon? Est-il méchant?") and Rosso di San Secondo.
For the 1925/26 season the 22-year-old avant-garde dance performer Yvonne Georgi accepted an engagement to lead the Gera theatre's dance troupe.Deutsches Bühnen-Jahrbuch 1926, p. 351 (Reußisches Theater Gera, Schauspiel- und Musikvorstände). She opened with a dance evening comprising Felix Petyrek's "Arabian suite" (featuring Georgi herself in a solo dance performance), Darius Milhaud's "Saudades do Brasil" and "Persisches Ballett" by Egon Wellesz. Georgi's innovative cheerfully comedic choreography caused a sensation across Germany, although according to at least one source the conservative locally based theatre goers of Gera mostly stayed away. On New Year's Eve at the end of 1925 there was a production of Vittorio Rieti's and Diaghilev's only recently unveiled choral-ballet "Barabau". Even critics from Berlin attended, and the production was toured both to the Leipzig Playhouse and to the Berlin People's Theatre. During 1926 Giorgi also choreographed Stravinsky's Pulcinella to widespread acclaim. Nevertheless, as 1926 drew to a close the entire dance troupe at Gera's Princely Reuß Theatre was dismissed "due to lack of public interest". Yvonne Georgi moved on to Hanover where her first evening production was of her own version of Pulcinella.
Iltz actively sought out young talent, undertaking trips across Germany to attend performances at small provincial theatres unannounced and normally unrecognised, on his talent spotting missions. While he was at Gera he "discovered" and recruited Hans Otto, Paul Hoffmann, Oscar Fritz Schuh and, in 1927, the young Bernhard Minetti.Klaus Völker: Bernhard Minetti. Meine Existenz ist mein Theaterleben. Propyläen, Berlin 2004, ISBN 978-3-549-07215-8 It was also on one of his talent scouting trips that he came across Dorothea Neff, whom many years later he engaged to work for him in a succession of leading roles at the People's Theatre in Vienna, and who would later pay tribute to Iltz's courage and steadfastness during a murderous time (after 1938).
Audience numbers at the Princely Reuß Theatre in Gera peaked under Iltz's directorship, at 240,832 for the 1925/26 season.
Düsseldorf