Lída Baarová

Lída Baarová (September 14, 1914 in Prague – October 28, 2000 in Salzburg) was a movie actress. Born Ludmila Babková, she studied acting at Prague's conservatory and got her first movie role in a Czech film at the age of 17. Her mother appeared in several theater plays and her younger sister, Zorka Jan?, was also a movie actress. Lida Baarova's first love affair was with the film director Karel Lama?. People who used to know her reminisce that she was the most beautiful woman they have ever seen. The foremost Czech movie director, Otakar Vavra said that her beauty likely infatuated every man she met. After being discovered by talent scouts for the German movie studios, Lida Baarova left Prague for Berlin.

The post-war years

In Czechoslovakia Lida Baarova faced a death sentence as many public figures who worked with Germans during the war did, but she was able to prove that she worked in Germany before the war and received only a prison sentence. Thus, in a way, her love affair with Joseph Goebbels and subsequent expulsion from Germany saved her life. In prison she was often visited by Jan Kopecky who, like many others, was infatuated by Lida's magic beauty. Jan Kopecky was a close relative of a prominent politician in the post-war government of Czechoslovakia who arranged Lida's release from prison. Jan Kopecky and Lida Baarova were married in 1949 and formed an itinerant troupe playing marionettes before they escaped to Austria. From there Jan Kopecky immigrated to Argentina, leaving Lida behind to recuperate in the sanatorium of Dr. Lundwall.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

In Austria, Lida attempted a comeback, but Anton Walbrook, who was persecuted during the war for his sexual orientation, withdrew from a film where he was cast together with Lida Baarova. To escape the resulting hate media campaign, she left for Argentina where she lived in extreme poverty. She decided to return to Italy. Her husband stayed in Argentina and they were divorced in 1956. Back in Italy, Lida Baarova appeared in several films, including Fellini's I Vitelloni (1953), where she played a Chinese girl. In 1958 she moved to Salzburg, where she performed in a theater. In 1970 she married Kurt Lundwall, a physician 20 years her senior. In the same year Rainer Werner Fassbinder gave her a part in The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant.

Related Topics:
Anton Walbrook - Argentina - Fellini's - Salzburg - Rainer Werner Fassbinder - The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~