Celebrity Biographies
wolfgang petersen
He started out directing films in his country, Germany, but the success of “The Submarine” led him to Hollywood, where he directed titles like “In the Line of Fire.” Director Wolfgang Petersen died on August 12, 2022, at the age of 81, a victim of pancreatic cancer at his home in Brentwood, Los Angeles.
Born on March 14, 1941 in Emden (Prussia), in northern Germany, Wolfgang Petersen studied between 1953 and 1960 at the Gelehrtenschule des Johanneums in Hamburg. He began his journey directing plays at the Ernst Deutsch Theater in Hamburg. Later, he attended the Berlin Academy of Film and Television (1966-1970).
He made his way into the audiovisual industry with works for German state television, such as the popular crime series Crime Scene , where the filmmaker met actor Jürgen Prochnow , who would later appear in his film The Submarine , from 1981, a huge international success, which garnered six Oscar nominations, quite a feat for a German feature film. Two of them were for Wolfgang Petersen himself , in the directing and script sections.
Bavaria studios financed the German blockbuster The Neverending Story , adaptation of the novel by his compatriot Michael Ende (who was horrified by the film), which swept the box office. Hollywood claimed him for My Enemy , a science fiction film where a human pilot is forced to live with his extraterrestrial rival, since both have crashed on a desert planet. Wolfgang Petersen next drew rave reviews with In the Line of Fire , starring Clint Eastwood as the bodyguard of the President of the United States.
Divorced in 1978 from Ursula Sieg, Wolfgang Petersen was united with Marie-Antoinette Borgel, who accompanied him until his death. With her he had her only child, the director and screenwriter Daniel Petersen.
He went on to hits with Outbreak , Air Force One (The President’s Plane) , The Perfect Storm , and Troy . After the discreet Poseidon , from 2006, which did not achieve the expected box office results, she left Ender’s Game , an adaptation of the novel by Orson Scott Card , due to disagreements with the producers. After a decade without directing, Wolfgang Petersen returned to German cinema with Four Against the Bank , his last work.