- Ernst Josef Aufricht was the son of a wealthy merchant and against his father's will he chose an acting career. At 20 years old he moved to Dresden from Gleiwitz, where his family were then living. He joined an acting ensemble at the Dresdener Stadtstheater (Municipal theatre). While there he acted in "Baccarat", his one and only movie. At 25 years he moved to Berlin and after a stint with "Die Truppe" in which he acted in a string of plays, he left the acting profession and became a theatre producer. Aufricht borrowed 100,000 Marks from his father and rented the Theater am Schiffbauerdam (now the Berliner Ensamble). He met Bertolt Brecht in a Berlin cafe and acquired a play based on Gay's "Beggars Opera". Brecht took much credit for the adaptation, but it was Elisabeth Hauptmann, who was the primary translator and adaptor. Kurt Weil added music (including the popular hit "Mack the Knife". The newly named "Dreigroschenoper" (Threepenny Opera) premiered on 31 August 1928. This was a major success, and Aufricht went on to produce a number of other plays/musicals until his escape from Nazi Germany in 1933 to France (Aufricht was Jewish and also considered too left wing for the authorities). Aufricht sat the war out in the USA but returned later to Cannes where he passed away in 1971.- IMDb Mini Biography By: Michael Alford
- With the rise of the National Socialists Ernst Josef Aufricht left Germany and went via Switzerland to France. When the German Reich entered France he left Europe in 1940 and emigrated to the USA.
- In March 1933, Aufricht went into exile in Switzerland; later to France. In Paris he tried to work again as a theater director, but was unsuccessful. The attempt to open a pension in Deauville (Calvados) was also unsuccessful. It was only when he rented the Théâtre de l'Étoile for the 1937 World Exhibition in Paris and staged the Threepenny Opera in a French translation that he was granted a small success.
- The actor Ernst Josef Aufricht became an actor against the will of his father. He got acting lessons by the famous actor Ludwig Hartau in Berlin and afterwards he made his stage debut at the age of 22 at the Staatstheater Dresden.
- Together with Berthold Viertel he founded the acting group "Die Truppe" in 1923. At this time his father had accepted the ambition of his son to be an actor and he supported him financially for the lease of a theater.
- A decisive point in his life was his conversion from the Jewish to the Catholic religion.
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