1.
Karlovy Vary
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Karlovy Vary or Carlsbad is a spa town situated in western Bohemia, Czech Republic, on the confluence of the rivers Ohře and Teplá, approximately 130 km west of Prague. It is named after Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Bohemia and it is historically famous for its hot springs. It is the most visited spa town in the Czech Republic, an ancient late Bronze Age fortified settlement was found in Drahovice. A Slavic settlement in Karlovy Vary is documented by findings in Tašovice, people lived in the close proximity of later Karlovy Vary as far back as the 13th century and they must have been aware of the curative effects of close thermal springs. Around 1350, Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor organized an expedition into the forests surrounding modern-day Karlovy Vary during a stay in Loket, on the site of a spring, he established a spa called the Horké Lázně u Lokte. The location was renamed after him once he had acclaimed the healing power of the hot springs. Charles IV granted the city privileges on 14 August 1370, earlier settlements can be also found in the outskirts of todays city. An important political event took place in the town in 1819, initiated by the Austrian Minister of State Klemens von Metternich, the decrees were intended to implement anti-liberal censorship within the German Confederation. It became more popular after railway lines to Cheb and Prague were completed in 1870, the number of visitors rose from 134 families in the 1756 season to 26,000 guests annually at the end of the 19th century. By 1911, that figure had reached 71,000, at the end of World War I in 1918, the large German-speaking population of Bohemia was incorporated into the new state of Czechoslovakia in accordance with the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye. As a result, the German-speaking majority of Karlovy Vary protested, a demonstration on 4 March 1919 passed peacefully, but later that month, six demonstrators were killed by Czech troops after a demonstration turned unruly. In 1938, the majority German-speaking areas of Czechoslovakia, known as the Sudetenland, after World War II, in accordance with the Potsdam Agreement, the vast majority of the people of Karlovy Vary were forcibly expelled from the city because of their German ethnicity. In accordance with the Beneš decrees, their property was confiscated without compensation, since the end of Communist rule in Czechoslovakia in 1989, and the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the presence of Russian businesses in Karlovy Vary has steadily increased. In 2012, foreigners were around 7% of the population of the Karlovy Vary region, after Prague, this is the highest proportion in the Czech Republic. The largest group of foreigners were Vietnamese, followed by Germans, Russians and Ukrainians, local buses and cable cars take passengers to most areas of the city. The city can be reached from other locations by inter-city buses, the city is connected by expressway R6. International Karlovy Vary Airport is located 4.5 km south-east from the city, the city is also known for the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, which is one of the oldest in the world and one of Europes major film events. It is also known for the popular Czech liqueur Becherovka and the production of the glass manufacturer Moser Glass
2.
Czech Republic
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The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, is a nation state in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west, Austria to the south, Slovakia to the east and Poland to the northeast. The Czech Republic covers an area of 78,866 square kilometres with mostly temperate continental climate and it is a unitary parliamentary republic, has 10.5 million inhabitants and the capital and largest city is Prague, with over 1.2 million residents. The Czech Republic includes the territories of Bohemia, Moravia. The Czech state was formed in the late 9th century as the Duchy of Bohemia under the Great Moravian Empire, after the fall of the Empire in 907, the centre of power transferred from Moravia to Bohemia under the Přemyslid dynasty. In 1002, the duchy was formally recognized as part of the Holy Roman Empire, becoming the Kingdom of Bohemia in 1198 and reaching its greatest territorial extent in the 14th century. Following the Battle of Mohács in 1526, the whole Crown of Bohemia was gradually integrated into the Habsburg Monarchy alongside the Archduchy of Austria, the Protestant Bohemian Revolt against the Catholic Habsburgs led to the Thirty Years War. After the Battle of the White Mountain, the Habsburgs consolidated their rule, reimposed Roman Catholicism, the Czech part of Czechoslovakia was occupied by Germany in World War II, and was liberated in 1945 by the armies of the Soviet Union and the United States. The Czech country lost the majority of its German-speaking inhabitants after they were expelled following the war, the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia won the 1946 elections. Following the 1948 coup détat, Czechoslovakia became a one-party communist state under Soviet influence, in 1968, increasing dissatisfaction with the regime culminated in a reform movement known as the Prague Spring, which ended in a Soviet-led invasion. Czechoslovakia remained occupied until the 1989 Velvet Revolution, when the communist regime collapsed, on 6 March 1990, the Czech Socialistic Republic was renamed to the Czech Republic. On 1 January 1993, Czechoslovakia peacefully dissolved, with its constituent states becoming the independent states of the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. The Czech Republic joined NATO in 1999 and the European Union in 2004, it is a member of the United Nations, the OECD, the OSCE, and it is a developed country with an advanced, high income economy and high living standards. The UNDP ranks the country 14th in inequality-adjusted human development, the Czech Republic also ranks as the 6th most peaceful country, while achieving strong performance in democratic governance. It has the lowest unemployment rate in the European Union, the traditional English name Bohemia derives from Latin Boiohaemum, which means home of the Boii. The current name comes from the endonym Čech, spelled Cžech until the reform in 1842. The name comes from the Slavic tribe and, according to legend, their leader Čech, the etymology of the word Čech can be traced back to the Proto-Slavic root *čel-, meaning member of the people, kinsman, thus making it cognate to the Czech word člověk. The country has traditionally divided into three lands, namely Bohemia in the west, Moravia in the southeast, and Czech Silesia in the northeast. Following the dissolution of Czechoslovakia at the end of 1992, the Czech part of the former nation found itself without a common single-word geographical name in English, the name Czechia /ˈtʃɛkiə/ was recommended by the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs
3.
Czechoslovakia
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From 1939 to 1945, following its forced division and partial incorporation into Nazi Germany, the state did not de facto exist but its government-in-exile continued to operate. From 1948 to 1990, Czechoslovakia was part of the Soviet bloc with a command economy and its economic status was formalized in membership of Comecon from 1949, and its defense status in the Warsaw Pact of May 1955. A period of liberalization in 1968, known as the Prague Spring, was forcibly ended when the Soviet Union, assisted by several other Warsaw Pact countries. In 1993, Czechoslovakia split into the two states of the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Form of state 1918–1938, A democratic republic, 1938–1939, After annexation of Sudetenland by Nazi Germany in 1938, the region gradually turned into a state with loosened connections among the Czech, Slovak, and Ruthenian parts. A large strip of southern Slovakia and Carpatho-Ukraine was annexed by Hungary, 1939–1945, The region was split into the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia and the Slovak Republic. A government-in-exile continued to exist in London, supported by the United Kingdom, United States and its Allies, after the German invasion of Russia, Czechoslovakia adhered to the Declaration by United Nations and was a founding member of the United Nations. 1946–1948, The country was governed by a government with communist ministers, including the prime minister. Carpathian Ruthenia was ceded to the Soviet Union, 1948–1989, The country became a socialist state under Soviet domination with a centrally planned economy. In 1960, the country became a socialist republic, the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic. It was a state of the Soviet Union. 1989–1990, The federal republic consisted of the Czech Socialist Republic, 1990–1992, Following the Velvet Revolution, the state was renamed the Czech and Slovak Federal Republic, consisting of the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. Neighbours Austria 1918–1938, 1945–1992 Germany Hungary Poland Romania 1918–1938 Soviet Union 1945–1991 Ukraine 1991–1992 Topography The country was of irregular terrain. The western area was part of the north-central European uplands, the eastern region was composed of the northern reaches of the Carpathian Mountains and lands of the Danube River basin. Climate The weather is mild winters and mild summers, influenced by the Atlantic Ocean from the west, Baltic Sea from the north, and Mediterranean Sea from the south. The area was long a part of the Austro Hungarian Empire until the Empire collapsed at the end of World War I, the new state was founded by Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, who served as its first president from 14 November 1918 to 14 December 1935. He was succeeded by his ally, Edvard Beneš. The roots of Czech nationalism go back to the 19th century, nationalism became a mass movement in the last half of the 19th century
4.
Film industry
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The film industry or motion picture industry comprises the technological and commercial institutions of filmmaking, i. e. Though the expense involved in making movies almost immediately led film production to concentrate under the auspices of standing production companies, advances in affordable film making equipment, and expansion of opportunities to acquire investment capital from outside the film industry itself, have allowed independent film production to evolve. Hollywood is the oldest film industry of the world and the largest in terms of box office gross, other centers include Hong Kong and in Europe the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Spain, and Germany are the countries that lead movie production. The worldwide theatrical market had a box office of US$38.3 billion in 2015. The top three continents/regions by box office gross were, Asia-Pacific with US$14.1 billion, North America with US$11.1 billion and Europe, distinct from the centers are the locations where movies are filmed. Because of labor and infrastructure costs, many films are produced in other than the one in which the company which pays for the film is located. For example, many U. S. movies are filmed in Canada, many Nigerian movies are filmed in Ghana, while many Indian movies are filmed in the Americas, Europe, Singapore etc. The cinema of the United States, often referred to as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. The United States cinema is the oldest film industry in the world which originated more than 121 years ago and also the largest film industry in terms of revenue. Hollywood is the nexus of the U. S. film industry with established film study facilities such as the American Film Institute, LA Film School. However, four of the six film studios are owned by East Coast companies. Today, American film studios collectively generate several hundred movies every year, only The Walt Disney Company — which owns the Walt Disney Studios — is fully based in Southern California. And while Sony Pictures Entertainment is headquartered in Culver City, California, its parent company, most shooting now takes place in California, New York, Louisiana, Georgia and North Carolina. Hollywood is the most popular film industry with the highest number of screens, between 2009-2015, Hollywood consistently grossed $10 billion annually. Jenkins used his Phantoscope to project his film before an audience of family, friends, the film featured a vaudeville dancer performing a Butterfly Dance. Jenkins and his new partner Thomas Armat modified the Phantoscope for exhibitions in temporary theaters at the Cotton States Exposition in the fall of 1895, the Phantoscope was later sold to Thomas Edison, who changed the name of the projector to Edisons Vitascope. Nestor Studios was Hollywoods first movie studio, founded on October 27,1911 It was built by David Horsley for Nestor Motion Picture Company and it was then owned and operated by David Horsley and his brother, William Horsley. The first motion picture stage in Hollywood was built behind the tavern, other East Coast studios had moved production to Los Angeles, prior to Nestors move west
5.
Velvet Revolution
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The Velvet Revolution or Gentle Revolution was a non-violent transition of power in what was then Czechoslovakia, occurring from November 17 to December 29,1989. Popular demonstrations against the one-party government of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia combined students, the result was the end of 41 years of one-party rule in Czechoslovakia, and the subsequent dismantling of the planned economy and conversion to a parliamentary republic. On November 17,1989, riot police suppressed a student demonstration in Prague and that event sparked a series of demonstrations from November 19 to late December. By November 20, the number of protesters assembled in Prague grew from 200,000 the previous day to an estimated 500,000, a two-hour general strike involving all citizens of Czechoslovakia was held on November 27. On November 24, the top leadership of the Communist Party, including General Secretary Miloš Jakeš. Two days later, the legislature deleted the sections of the Constitution giving the Communists a monopoly of power. Barbed wire and other obstructions were removed from the border with West Germany, on December 10, President Gustáv Husák appointed the first largely non-communist government in Czechoslovakia since 1948, and resigned. Alexander Dubček was elected speaker of the parliament on December 28. In June 1990, Czechoslovakia held its first democratic elections since 1946, the term Velvet Revolution was coined by Rita Klímová, the dissidents English translator who later became the ambassador to the United States. The term was used internationally to describe the revolution, although the Czechs also used the term internally, after the dissolution of Czechoslovakia in 1993, Slovakia used the term Gentle Revolution, the term that Slovaks used for the revolution from the beginning. The Czech Republic continues to refer to the event as the Velvet Revolution, the Communist Party seized power on February 25,1948. No official opposition parties operated thereafter, dissidents published home-made periodicals, but they faced persecution by the secret police. Thus, the public did not openly support the dissidents for fear of dismissal from work or school. A writer or filmmaker could have his/her books or films banned for an attitude towards the socialist regime. These rules were easy to enforce, as all schools, media and they were under direct supervision and often were used as accusatory weapons against rivals. The nature of blacklisting changed gradually after the introduction of Mikhail Gorbachevs policies of Glasnost, the Czechoslovak Communist leadership verbally supported Perestroika, but made few changes. Speaking about the Prague Spring of 1968 was taboo, the first anti-government demonstrations occurred in 1988 and 1989, but these were dispersed and participants were repressed by the police. By the late 1980s, discontent with living standards and economic inadequacy gave way to support for economic reform
6.
Robert De Niro
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Robert Anthony De Niro is an American actor, producer and director who has both Italian and American citizenship. He was cast as the young Vito Corleone in the 1974 film The Godfather Part II and his longtime collaboration with director Martin Scorsese earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of Jake La Motta in the 1980 film Raging Bull. He received the AFI Life Achievement Award in 2003, the Golden Globe Cecil B, deMille Award in 2010, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama in 2016. De Niros first major roles were in the sports drama, Bang the Drum Slowly. He earned Academy Award nominations for the psychological thrillers Taxi Driver and Cape Fear, De Niro received additional nominations for Michael Ciminos Vietnam war drama, The Deer Hunter, Penny Marshalls drama Awakenings, and David O. Russells romantic comedy-drama, Silver Linings Playbook. His portrayal of gangster Jimmy Conway in Scorseses crime film, Goodfellas, other notable performances include roles in Once Upon a Time in America, Brazil, The Untouchables, Heat, and Casino. He has directed and starred in such as the crime drama A Bronx Tale. Robert Anthony De Niro was born in the Greenwich Village area of Manhattan, New York, the son of Virginia Admiral and Robert De Niro Sr. Both of his parents were painters, his father was of half Italian and half Irish descent, while his mother was of half German ancestry, with her other roots being French, English and Dutch. De Niros parents, who had met at the classes of Hans Hofmann in Provincetown, Massachusetts. De Niro was raised by his mother in the Greenwich Village and his father lived within walking distance and De Niro spent much time with him as he grew up. His mother was raised Presbyterian but became an atheist as an adult, against his parents wishes, his grandparents had him secretly baptized into the Catholic Church while he was staying with them during his parents divorce. De Niro attended PS41, an elementary school in Manhattan. He then went to Elisabeth Irwin High School, the upper school of the Little Red School House. He was accepted into the High School of Music and Art for the ninth grade, De Niro began high school at the private McBurney School and later attended the private Rhodes Preparatory School, although he never graduated from either. Nicknamed Bobby Milk for his pallor, De Niro hung out with a group of kids as a youth in Little Italy. The direction of his future had already been foreshadowed by his debut at age 10. Along with finding relief from shyness through performing, he was also fixated by cinema and he studied acting at the Stella Adler Conservatory, as well as Lee Strasbergs Actors Studio
7.
Richard Gere
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Richard Tiffany Gere is an American actor and humanitarian activist. He began acting in the 1970s, playing a role in Looking for Mr. Goodbar. He came to prominence in 1980 for his role in the film American Gigolo, which established him as a leading man, Gere was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. His mother, Doris Ann, was a housewife and his father, Homer George Gere, was an insurance agent for the Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company, and had originally intended to become a minister. Gere is their eldest son and second child and his paternal great-grandfather had changed the spelling of the surname from Geer. Both of his parents were Mayflower descendants, Geres ancestors include Pilgrims Francis Eaton, John Billington, George Soule, Richard Warren, Degory Priest, Francis Cooke and William Brewster. In 1967, Gere graduated from North Syracuse Central High School and he attended the University of Massachusetts Amherst on a gymnastics scholarship, majoring in philosophy, but did not graduate, leaving after two years. Gere first worked professionally at the Seattle Repertory Theatre and Provincetown Playhouse on Cape Cod in 1971 and his first major acting role was in the original London stage version of Grease in 1973. He began appearing in Hollywood films in the mid-1970s, originally cast in a starring role in The Lords of Flatbush, he was replaced after fighting with another star of the film, Sylvester Stallone. He played a small but memorable part in Looking for Mr. Goodbar and starred in the director Terrence Malicks well-reviewed 1978 film, Days of Heaven. Gere was one of the first notable Hollywood actors to play a gay character, Gere won a Theatre World Award for his performance. Gere experienced several box office failures after 1982, but his career rebounded with the releases of Internal Affairs and he starred in several successful films throughout the 1990s, including Sommersby, Primal Fear and Runaway Bride. He also took a role in the 1997 action movie The Jackal. Geres 2004 ballroom dancing drama Shall We Dance. was also a performer that grossed $170 million worldwide. His next film, the 2005 adapted novel Bee Season, was a commercial failure, in 2008, Gere co-starred with Diane Lane in the romantic drama Nights in Rodanthe. The film was panned by critics, but grossed over $84 million worldwide. Later in his career, Gere was honored twice for his lifetime achievement, regarding his 2012 performance in Arbitrage, Lou Lumenick of the New York Post said Richard Gere gives the best performance of his career. He received an award from the 34th Cairo International Film Festival in December 2010, Gere had a relationship with actress Penelope Milford from 1971 to 1978
8.
Documentary film
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A documentary film is a nonfictional motion picture intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education, or maintaining a historical record. Documentary has been described as a practice, a cinematic tradition. Polish writer and filmmaker Bolesław Matuszewski was among those who identified the mode of documentary film and he wrote two of the earliest texts on cinema Une nouvelle source de lhistoire and La photographie animée. Both were published in 1898 in French and among the written works to consider the historical. Matuszewski is also among the first filmmakers to propose the creation of a Film Archive to collect, the American film critic Pare Lorentz defines a documentary film as a factual film which is dramatic. Others further state that a documentary stands out from the types of non-fiction films for providing an opinion. Documentary practice is the process of creating documentary projects. Documentary filmmaking can be used as a form of journalism, advocacy, early film was dominated by the novelty of showing an event. They were single-shot moments captured on film, a train entering a station and these short films were called actuality films, the term documentary was not coined until 1926. Many of the first films, such as made by Auguste and Louis Lumière, were a minute or less in length. Films showing many people were made for commercial reasons, the people being filmed were eager to see, for payment. One notable film clocked in at over an hour and a half, using pioneering film-looping technology, Enoch J. Rector presented the entirety of a famous 1897 prize-fight on cinema screens across the United States, in May 1896, Bolesław Matuszewski recorded on film few surigical operations in Warsaw and Saint Petersburg hospitals. In 1898, French surgeon Eugène-Louis Doyen invited Bolesław Matuszewski and Clément Maurice and they started in Paris a series of surgical films sometime before July 1898. Until 1906, the year of his last film, Doyen recorded more than 60 operations, Doyen said that his first films taught him how to correct professional errors he had been unaware of. These and five other of Doyens films survive, all these short films have been preserved. I must say I forgot those works and I am thankful to you that you reminded them to me, unfortunately, not many scientists have followed your way. Travelogue films were popular in the early part of the 20th century
9.
Harvey Keitel
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Harvey Keitel is an American actor and producer. Along with actors Al Pacino and Ellen Burstyn, he is the current co-president of the Actors Studio, Keitel was born in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, the son of Miriam and Harry Keitel, Jewish immigrants from Romania and Poland, respectively. His parents owned and ran a luncheonette and his also worked as a hat maker. Keitel grew up in the Brighton Beach section of Brooklyn, with his sister, Renee and he attended Abraham Lincoln High School. At the age of sixteen, he decided to join the United States Marine Corps, after his return to the United States, he was a court reporter for several years and was able to support himself before beginning his acting career. Keitel studied under both Stella Adler and Lee Strasberg and at the HB Studio, eventually landing roles in some Off-Broadway productions. During this time, Keitel auditioned for filmmaker Martin Scorsese and gained a role as J. R. in Scorseses first feature film. Since then, Scorsese and Keitel have worked together on several projects, Keitel had the starring role in Scorseses Mean Streets, which also proved to be Robert De Niros breakthrough film. In 1978, Keitel starred in the directorial debuts of Paul Schrader, Ridley Scott, cast as Captain Willard in Francis Ford Coppolas Apocalypse Now, Keitel was involved with the first week of principal photography in the Philippines. Coppola was not happy with Keitels take on Willard, stating that the found it difficult to play him a passive onlooker. After viewing the first weeks footage, Coppola replaced Keitel with a casting session favorite, Keitel drifted into obscurity through most of the 1980s. He continued to do work on stage and screen, but usually in the stereotypical role of a thug. Keitel played Judas in Martin Scorseses controversial The Last Temptation of Christ and co-starred with Jack Nicholson in the Chinatown sequel The Two Jakes, the following year, Keitel played another mobster in the Whoopi Goldberg-starring comedy Sister Act. Keitel starred in Quentin Tarantinos Reservoir Dogs in 1992, where his performance as Mr. White took his career to a different level, since then, Keitel has chosen his roles with care, seeking to change his image and show a broader acting range. One of those roles was the character in Bad Lieutenant, about a self-loathing. He co-starred in the movie The Piano in 1993, and played an efficient clean-up expert, Keitel starred as a police detective in Spike Lees Clockers. In 1999, Keitel was replaced by Sydney Pollack on the set of Stanley Kubricks Eyes Wide Shut, due to shooting conflicts, Keitel also re-teamed with Jane Campion for Holy Smoke. He also appeared in the Steinlager Pure commercials in New Zealand in 2007, unlike many American male actors, Keitel has appeared nude in several films, including full frontal nudity in Bad Lieutenant and The Piano
10.
Rita Hayworth
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Rita Hayworth was an American actress and dancer. She achieved fame during the 1940s as one of the top stars. The press coined the term love goddess to describe Hayworth after she had become the most glamorous screen idol of the 1940s and she was the top pin-up girl for GIs during World War II. Hayworth is perhaps best known for her performance in the 1946 film noir, Gilda, opposite Glenn Ford, Fred Astaire, with whom she made two films, called her his favorite dance partner. Her greatest success was in the Technicolor musical Cover Girl, with Gene Kelly and she is listed as one of the top-25 female motion picture stars of all time in the American Film Institutes survey, AFIs 100 Years.100 Stars. In 1980, Hayworth was diagnosed with Alzheimers disease, which contributed to her death at age 68, the public disclosure and discussion of her illness drew attention to Alzheimers, and helped to increase public and private funding for Alzheimers research. Hayworth was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1918 as Margarita Carmen Cansino and her father, Eduardo Cansino, Sr. was from Castilleja de la Cuesta, a little town near Seville, Spain. Her mother, Volga Hayworth, was an American of Irish-English descent who had performed with the Ziegfeld Follies and they also had two sons, Eduardo Cansino, Jr. and Vernon Cansino. Margaritas father wanted her to become a dancer, while her mother hoped she would become an actress. Her paternal grandfather, Antonio Cansino, was renowned as a Spanish classical dancer and he popularized the bolero, and his dancing school in Madrid was world-famous. Hayworth later recalled, From the time I was three and a half … as soon as I could stand on my own feet, I was given dance lessons. She noted I didnt like it very much … but I didnt have the courage to tell my father, rehearse, rehearse, rehearse, that was my girlhood. She attended dance classes every day for a few years in a Carnegie Hall complex and she performed publicly from the age of six. In 1926 at the age of eight, she was featured in La Fiesta, in 1927, her father took the family to Hollywood. He believed that dancing could be featured in the movies and that his family could be part of it and he established his own dance studio, where he taught such stars as James Cagney and Jean Harlow. During the Great Depression, he lost all his investments as commercial interest in his dancing classes waned, in 1931, Eduardo Cansino partnered with his 12-year-old daughter to form an act called the Dancing Cansinos. Since under California law Margarita was too young to work in nightclubs and bars, her father took her with him to work across the border in Tijuana, in the early 1930s, it was a popular tourist spot for people from Los Angeles. Because she was working, Cansino never graduated high school
11.
Maximilian Schell
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Maximilian Schell was a Swiss film and stage actor, who also wrote, directed and produced some of his own films. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for the 1961 American film Judgment at Nuremberg, born in Austria, his parents were involved in the arts and he grew up surrounded by acting and literature. While he was a child, his family fled to Switzerland in 1938 when Austria was annexed by Nazi Germany, after World War II ended, Schell took up acting or directing full-time. He appeared in numerous German films, often anti-war, before moving on to Hollywood, Schell was top billed in a number of Nazi-era themed films, as he could speak both English and German. For his role as Vladimir Lenin in the film, Stalin. On stage, Schell acted in a number of plays, in Schells private life, he was an accomplished pianist and conductor, performing with Claudio Abbado and Leonard Bernstein, and with orchestras in Berlin and Vienna. His elder sister, Maria Schell, was also a noted Hollywood actress, about whom he produced the documentary, My Sister Maria, in 2002. Schell was born in Vienna, Austria, the son of Margarethe, an actress who ran a school, and Hermann Ferdinand Schell. Schells father was never enthusiastic about young Maximilian becoming an actor like his mother, however, Schell was surrounded by acting in his early youth, I grew up in a theatre atmosphere and took it for granted. I remember the theatre, as a child, the way most people remember their mothers cooking, acting was all around me, and so was poetry. I made my debut in the theatre at the age of three, in Vienna, the Schell family was forced to flee Vienna in 1938 to get away from Hitler after the Anschluss, when Austria was annexed by Nazi Germany. In Zurich, Schell grew up reading the classics, and when he was ten, Schell later attended the University of Zurich for a year, where he also played soccer and was on the rowing team, along with writing for newspapers as a part-time journalist for income. Following the end of World War II, he moved to Germany where he enrolled in the University of Munich and studied philosophy and art history. During breaks, he would return home to Zurich or stay at his familys farm in the country so he could write in seclusion, My father and my uncle hunt deer there. I like to walk through the forest by myself, Schell then returned to Zurich, where he served in the Swiss Army for a year, after which he re-entered the University of Zurich for another year, and later, the University of Basel for six months. To me it is more important. To admire and feel and be stimulated and inspired, art comes out of chaos, not out of a mechanical analyzing. So as soon as I made up my mind, there was no sense any more in continuing to study and it is like an award, it does not mean anything in itself
