Rolf Boysen was one of the outstanding German actors:he played "Nathan the Wise", "Ulysses" and "Othello". His interpretation of "King Lear" became a legend. The "Bayerischer Rundfunk" called him "seething giant".
Born on March 31, 1920 in Flensburg and raised in Hamburg-Ottensen from the age of four, Boysen found his artistic home after a number of stations in Munich. Before that, he delighted audiences in Kiel, at the Lower Saxony State Theater in Hanover and was a member of the ensemble at the Deutsches Schauspielhaus in Hamburg for ten years. He became known to a larger audience on television in the lead role in the four-part ZDF production of "Wallenstein".
Great storyteller of great epics
In the last years before his death he impressed as a great storyteller. He made Homer's "Iliad" and "Odyssey" sound excitingly lively, as well as the Nibelungenlied, which is considered the great German epic of the Middle Ages. His lecture has always fascinated the audience - a whole series of his extraordinary readings could be heard on NDR Kultur, many are also available as audio books.
Last big BR interview at the age of 92
In the last major interview that Boysen gave to Bayerischer Rundfunk at the age of 92, the actor spoke about his way of working:"I hate to use that word:natural. I've never tried to be natural. Natural, yes." Naturalness is difficult to achieve because it is so unknown. "It can only lie in honesty - the honesty of feeling and the honesty of working with the text. That's what matters," says Boysen.
Boysen died on May 16, 2014 at the age of 94 in Munich. There he belonged to the ensemble of the Kammerspiele.