Boris Alekin

Slight, skinny, sweet-faced, with light blue eyes and wavy blond hair, young Boris Alekin fled the October Revolution and settled down in Germany. The young Russian who could speak four languages (Russian, German, English and French) soon became an actor in his host country, mainly in the theater (The Volksbühne in Berlin, the Rose-Theater in Berlin and even on Broadway for a few months in early 1935) but also before the cameras, although he was not given very interesting parts to play. He can be seen in minor roles (a student,a waiter, a bellboy, a small-time crook, a politician, a musician, a low-ranking officer) in thirteen movies, a few of which are above average such as La Habanera (1937) and To New Shores (1937) (both directed by Douglas Sirk), Trenck, der Pandur (1940), a fine Hans Albers vehicle and Friedemann Bach (1941), 'Traugott Mûller''s excellent account of the life of Johann Sebastian Bach's wayward son. In 1941, the still young actor was mobilized and sent to the Eastern Front. The irony of fate had it that Alekin who had run away from his country came back there only to die there in a military hospital. This was March 1942. Boris Alekin was not yet thirty-seven. Another life and another talent shattered by war.