Rosa Albach-Retty

Rosa Albach-Retty (born Rosa Clara Franziska Helene Retty; 26 December 1874 – 26 August 1980) was an Austrian film and stage actress. Life Born into a well-known family of actors, she was the daughter of actor and director . Trained by her father, she began her stage career in 1890 at the Deutsches Theater and the Lessing Theater in Berlin, where she performed as Franziska on Minna von Barnhelm. Hermann Sudermann wrote his play , which premiered in 1894 at the Lessing Theater, for her. She was also known for breeches roles in Little Lord Fauntleroy and The Merchant of Venice (1909 at the Burgtheater). In 1895, she went to the Volkstheater in Vienna and in 1903 joined the Burgtheater ensemble, where she received the title of Hofschauspielerin (Actress of the Court) in 1912. She became an honorary member of the Burgtheater in 1928 and in 1958 she gave her final performance. She was married to the Austro-Hungarian Army officer Karl Albach; she was the mother of Wolf Albach-Retty (1906–1967), an Austrian movie actor who married German movie actress Magda Schneider in 1937. She thereby was the grandmother of actress Romy Schneider and great-grandmother of actress Sarah Biasini. Albach-Retty made her first film appearance in 1930, in Georg Jacoby's Money on the Street, and made her last appearance in the 1955 remake The Congress Dances directed by Franz Antel. She died in 1980 at the age of 105, not long after she had published her autobiography So kurz sind 100 Jahre for her hundredth birthday. Her grave of honour and that of her son is located in the Vienna Central Cemetery (group 32 C, number 50).