Grete Mosheim

Grete Mosheim, born Margarete Emma Dorothea Mosheim on 8 January 1905 in Berlin, Germany, was a German actress whose career spanned film, theatre, and television across multiple countries and decades. The daughter of Markus Mosheim, a Jewish man born in 1868, and his non-Jewish wife Clara Mosheim née Hilger, born in 1875, she grew up in Berlin alongside her sister Lore Mosheim, who would also pursue an acting career and appear in at least nine films. Mosheim died on 29 December 1986 in New York City from cancer, at the age of 81.

Mosheim began her acting career at seventeen, enrolling in early 1922 at Max Reinhardt's School of Drama, where she studied under Berthold Held. Among her classmates was Marlene Dietrich. That same year she joined the Deutsches Theater in Berlin, where she remained a member until 1931. Her rise to prominence came in 1925 when Reinhardt called upon her to replace the ailing female lead in René Fauchois's play Der sprechende Affe. She learned the demanding role from Albert Bassermann in a single day and emerged from the production a major star. Through 1933 she was a leading figure in the Berlin theatre world, performing with equal facility in dramatic and comedic roles, appearing in musical revues, and recording songs by Friedrich Hollaender and others.

Her film career began in 1924 with the German production Michael, and she went on to appear in numerous German silent films throughout the late 1920s. As sound cinema arrived, she starred in Dreyfus in 1930 and Yorck in 1931, among other productions. In 1933, with Adolf Hitler's rise to power, Mosheim left Germany for London. After intensive study of English, she was able to perform on the London stage in 1935 in Two Share a Dwelling by Alice Campbell. That same year she also starred in the British film Car of Dreams.

Mosheim's Broadway career extended from 1941 to 1955 and included appearances in the comedy Calico Wedding, the drama Letters to Lucerne, and Threepenny Opera. Her stage work in Germany resumed in 1952, though she largely stayed away from film work for decades. In 1976 she appeared in Rosa von Praunheim's film Underground and Emigrants, and in 1978 she took the role of the grandmother in the German film Moritz, Dear Moritz, her first German film appearance in many years. Later in her career she also took on television roles.

In her personal life, Mosheim was married three times. Her first marriage, to actor Oskar Homolka, took place in Berlin and lasted from 1928 to 1933. She subsequently married industrialist Howard Gould in London, a union that lasted from 1937 to 1948. Her third husband was Robert Cooper, a journalist who served as a correspondent for The Times. She had no children. In 1984, the Federal Republic of Germany awarded her the Order of Merit, the country's highest civilian honor.