Biography

Max Ehrlich

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Max Ehrlich (1892-1944) was one of the most celebrated actors and directors on the German comedy and cabaret scene of the 1930s. But his brilliant career was brutally interrupted by the rise of Nazism and his resulting deportation in 1942 to Westerbork concentration camp in Holland. Amazingly, there behind the walls and barbed wire, Max Ehrlich formed a theater troupe composed of fellow prisoners - the majority of them also famous Jewish show business personalities - and produced high quality musical and comedy revues. This artistic activity provided the means for everyone concerned, audience and actors alike, to retain a small measure of humanity, free their minds - if only momentarily - from the tragedy of daily life and nourish the illusion of survival. But, in the end, comedy did not prevail: like almost all of his colleagues from this theater of despair, in 1944 Max Ehrlich was transported to Auschwitz and gassed.
- IMDb mini biography by: alan.ehrlich@span.ch

In 1937 he left Germany and with the help of Ernst Lubitsch he went to the USA. Unfortunately he was not able to get work there, so he made the fatal decision to return to Europe. In 1939 he went to Holland to Willy Rosen and his Theater der Prominente and stood there even when the German occupied the country.
Max Ehrlich took part in over 40 movies and directed ten of it in his career. He published several records and wrote the book "From Adalbert to Zilzer", in which he wrote humorous stories and anecdotes about many of his colleagues.
As a Jew he wasn't able to work under the National Socialists and he appeared in Vienna. But his performances were also disturbed there and he went to Switzerland and Holland with his theater group.
The actor Max Ehrlich belonged to the celebrated cabaret artists of the 30's whose tragic end was sealed by the National Socialists. A destiny he had to share with the actors Otto Wallburg and Kurt Gerron among others.
Following the 1938 pogrom "Kristallnacht," he decided to leave Germany definitively. Both of his farewell performances immediately sold out, so that a third presentation on 2 April 1939 was added. Here, in front of a full house of fans, calling out their affection and encouragement, Ehrlich made his final appearance in Germany.

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