Catherine the Great
Feature Film, GB 1934, Schwarzweiß, 93 min., eOF
Diagonale 2013
Director: Paul Czinner
Script: Arthur Wimperis, Marjorie Deans nach dem Schauspiel „Die Zarin“ von Lajos Biro und Melchior Lengyel
Cast: Elisabeth Bergner, Douglas Fairbanks jr., Flora Robson, Irene Vanbrugh, Diana Napier, Sir Gerald du Maurier
Camera: Georges Pérnial
Editor: Harold Young, Stephen Harrison
Location Sound: A.W. Watkins
Music: Muir Mathieson, Ernst Toch (ungenannt)
Producers: Alexander Korda, Ludovico Toeplitz
Production: London Films
Shortly after its premiere, this fairytale-like blend of historical epic, melodrama and comedy was banned in Germany by the Nazis due to its “non-Aryan” leading lady, Elisabeth Bergner. In this ballet-styled production, Bergner plays a German princess who, between military parades and revolution, grows into a cunning Russian czarina.