Dagmar Manzel

Born in 1958 in Berlin, Dagmar Manzel studied at the Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Art in Berlin. From 1980 to 1983 she was engaged by the Staatsschauspiel Dresden and from 1983 to 2001, she joined the ensemble of the Deutsches Theater Berlin. Since then she has worked as a freelance actress and singer. Dagmar Manzel has received numerous awards for her work in theatre. She was voted Actress of the Year in 2002 by the critics’ jury of Theater heute. She has been twice awarded the Grimme Prize and the German Television Award, as well as the Bavarian Prize for Television, the PAULA Film Prize, the German Theatre Prize "Der Faust" and the German Audio Books Prize. In 2016, she was selected by the members of the German Academy for Television as Best Actress. Her most recent works for the cinema include Die Unsichtbare (director: Christian Schwochow), Die verlorene Zeit (director: Anna Justice), Zettl (director: Helmut Dietl), Stiller Sommer (director: Nana Neul) and Lonely Emma (director: Ingo Rasper). Since 2014, Dagmar Manzel has played the role of commissioner in the Franken Tatort. Dagmar Menzel is especially passionate about music: after her successful solo lieder recital, Ich bin ein Wesen leichter Art, she delivered a brilliant performance at the Deutsches Theater in the title role of Offenbach’s operetta Die Großherzogin von Gerolstein and as Périchole in Offenbach’s operetta La Périchole at the Berliner Ensemble. Further evidence of her versatile talent can be found on her CD Irgendwo auf der Welt …, which commemorates composer Werner Richard Heymann’s expulsion from Germany; or on the CD MENSCHENsKIND, which was released by Deutsche Grammophon. In Aufbau-Verlag, her conversational biography with Knut Elstermann was published under the same title in 2017. Helmut Oehring composed an opera for Dagmar Manzel and the Ensemble Modern, which premiered in Wiesbaden in 2016: Agota? Die Analphabetin – based on texts by Ágota Kristóf. The role of Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd was her first work at the Komische Oper Berlin. There she went on to perform the role of Lilli Vanessi/Katharina in Kiss me, Kate to great acclaim, as well as Sieben Songs/Die sieben Todsünden by Brecht/Weill, which was commended both by audience and critics, and Paul Abraham’s Ball im Savoy. Since the 2017/18 season, she is performing at the Komische Oper Berlin in two operettas by Oscar Strauss: in the role of Cleopatra in Perlen der Cleopatra and as Eine Frau, die weiß, was sie will! In December 2017, she celebrated the premiere of ANATEVKA as Golde. At the Deutsches Theater she will continue to play in the two-person drama Gift (Lot Vekemans). In 2017, Dagmar Manzel received the "Goldener Vorhang", the audience award of the Berlin Theater Club, for her roles in Glückliche Tage, Gift and Die Perlen der Cleopatra.