Biography
Kurt Gerron, also credited as Kurt Gerson, was a German Jewish actor and film director. Born in Berlin on 11 May 1897, he began his career on the stage after the First World War, appearing in productions including the 1928 Berlin premiere of Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill's The Threepenny Opera.
He became known for film roles such as Kiepert in Josef von Sternberg's The Blue Angel (1930) and Achaz in One Night at the Grand Hotel (1931). He also directed several comedies in the early sound era. After the Nazi seizure of power in 1933, Gerron fled Germany and later settled in the Netherlands. In 1944 he was deported to the Theresienstadt Ghetto, where he was forced to direct the Nazi propaganda film Theresienstadt: A Documentary Film from the Jewish Settlement Area. He and his wife were murdered at Auschwitz on 30 October 1944.
