Leading German character actor, the son of an engineer and a ballet dancer. Trained as a dancer at the Vienna Academy for Music and Performing Arts and studied acting at the
Max Reinhardt Seminar. Began on stage in "Kiss Me Kate" at the Vienna Volksoper. On screen from 1956 and noted in the 1970s for strong performances in several films by
Rainer Werner Fassbinder. Appeared in several international productions during the 1980s and became a major TV star of the '90s as the title character of the crime series
Peter Strohm (1989), which he also directed.
