Klaus Kinski is just as famous for his choleric as he is for his films. Now it is the anniversary of the death and the most legendary appearance of the film star, whose work is now shadowed.
At the latest after the abuse allegations of his two daughters Nastassja and Pola, Klaus Kinski is now seen in a different light.
When you think back, he no longer just appears as the ingenious actor with an entertaining and choleric streak, but also as a man who is guilty of the sexual abuse of his children. The film star, famous for his anger, died 30 years ago (23.11.) At the age of 65 in his house in Lagunitas near San Francisco.
The actor, who was born in the Baltic Sea resort of Sopot near Danzig, went down in cinema history primarily for his collaboration with director Werner Herzog (“Aguirre, the Wrath of God”, “Nosferatu – Phantom of the Night”, “Woyzeck”, “Fitzcarraldo”, “Cobra” Verde »).
Violent tantrum
Some are still fascinated by him today, others only feel foreign shame. With Kinski, whom the comedian Max Giermann can confusingly imitate similarly, the fuse was quickly on.
Probably the most violent tantrum occurred 50 years ago. It was November 20, 1971, when Kinski wanted to premiere his monologue text «Jesus Christ Redeemer» in the Deutschlandhalle (which was blown up in 2011) in Berlin-Westend. It was a text of 30 pages, and about an hour and a half were planned for the presentation.
Around 5,000 people came; entry cost three, five or ten D-Marks. The evening turned out to be a disaster, as the 2008 documentary “Jesus Christ Redeemer” by Peter Geyer impressively shows.
After just a few minutes, the undisturbed recitation was over. Laughter, blasphemy, heckling (“Kinski is not Jesus”) dominated the hall. Hundreds of people made fun of disrupting the solemn anti-authoritarian happening-style event. And Kinski let himself be provoked, quickly fell out of his role.
It was a high point of the foul-mouthed theater when Kinski called a disturbing man on stage: “Come here now, who has such a big mouth!” The viewer came up and said into the microphone that he believed that Kinski was not the Jesus that some of the audience might be looking for, because Jesus had been “tolerant” and if there was a contradiction, he would not “shut up!” shouted. The mustache handed the microphone back over and left. Now Kinski broke out: «No, he did not say” shut up “. He took a whip and hit him in the face! He did that. You stupid pig! “
The end of the performance
As a result, the situation continued to escalate. Kinski broke off, had a man thrown off the stage, said sentences like “And if there is only one person left who wants to hear that, he’ll have to wait until the other fucking rabble has left!” Spectators entered the stage and turned to the audience via microphone and demanded that Kinski should apologize for his “fascist methods”.
Kinski declared the evening over several times. At some point, most of the audience had left the hall. At around midnight, Kinski reappeared in front of the stage, where around 100 to 200 people were waiting. He started again, without a microphone. He interrupted again because of the noise. «Can’t you imagine that a person who has to talk about 30 typewriter pages means that you just have to shut up? Can’t you imagine Then have someone hammer it into your brain. “
Finally he read the whole text. It was over at 2 o’clock.
In the following decades with international success, domiciled in California and now and then also TV appearances in Germany, around 1985 with Thomas Gottschalk in “Na sowas!”, Kinski liked to flirt with his role as “the difficult one” and bitchy star.
Allegations of the daughter
It was only posthumously in 2013 that his daughter Pola, born in Berlin in 1952, accused him of serious sexual abuse. The attacks began when she was five years old and did not end until she was 19.
Klaus Kinski can no longer defend himself. However, Pola Kinski’s description was generally felt to be credible.
His second daughter, Nastassja Kinski, said he molested her when she was four or five. “99 percent of the time I was terrified of him.” If he were still alive, she would do anything to put him in jail.
Pola Kinski once told the “Stern” that she had written her revelatory book “Kindermund” because she could no longer bear the fact that Klaus Kinski was being hailed more and more as a genius, a sensitive man.