Who Are Those Guys? - Bob Bolander

Kurt Egon ‘Bob’ Bolander was born in Konigsberg, East Prussia, Germany on January 27, 1896. He was born a Hotelier's son Kurt Egon Bolander - due to his mother, Emma Bobeth, he initially called Kurt Bobeth Bolander, later mostly Bob Bolander. He had already as an actor at the city theater of his hometown of Königsberg, which he faithfully remained for a total of three years. After leaving school, he took regular acting lessons. As a colleague in a production of Schiller's “The Robbers” Bolander was able to get his first role. Then in the midst of World War I he moved to Berlin, where he immediately found work in the film business.

 

Kurt Bolander received his first starring role in 1917 in “Das Spiel vom Tode”. Bob was also active, as a boxer and won the German Bantam Weight Championship in 1919 and henceforth was the only actor and professional boxer in Germany. A little later Bobeth Bolander lost his title in a fight against Willy Menke in Berlin at the Admiral Palace. His popularity in the early years after the end of the First World War subsided pretty quickly and he found himself repeatedly unemployed for a long time and found it difficult to obtain employment. He eventually received a batch of small roles in the talkies little more than extended cameos. He then became an entertainer (emcee) on vaudeville stages and in cabarets and worked occasionally as a voice actor.

 

Bolander was working as a manager in 1927 where he discovered at the "Cafe Fürstenhof" a young Berliner athlete named Alex Topka. Was also known as "Audax Alexius" and Miss Martha Chevalier, the "memory phenomenon" Manager Bolander went on tour - with Topka. They went on, inter alia, in the "Berlin variety theater conservatory", the "Scala variety Theather" and in the "Passage Panopticon". He was a member of the Barberina entertainment ensemble from 1945-1950.

 

During the Second World War he was mainly an entertainer in the context of caring for programs for the troops in the German-occupied territories. Even after the war, Bolander hit more bad times more than good living in East of Berlin. He received mainly character roles offered by DEFA. There, he played in all kinds of roles such as - servants and townsman, politicians, secretaries, waiters and other ordinary citizen roles.

 

Bolander died in East Berlin, Germany on October 4, 1961.

 

BOLANDER, Bob (aka Kurt Bobeth-Bolander) (Kurt Egon Bolander) [1/27/1896, Konigsberg, Prussia - 10/4/1961, East Berlin, Berlin, Germany] – boxer (bantamweight), vaudeville emcee, voice actor.

Der rote Reiter - 1918

Black Jack - 1919 (cowboy)