Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck

Florian Maria Georg Christian, Graf Henckel von Donnersmarck, Phelim O'Neill, The Guardian, (6 April 2007) (born May 2, 1973) is a German film director, best known for writing and directing the 2007 Oscar-winning film The Lives of Others and the 2010 film The Tourist.

Personal life and family

He was born in Cologne, Germany, into the noble family Henckel von Donnersmarck and grew up in New York, Brussels, Frankfurt and West Berlin. He is fluent in English, German, French, Russian and Italian. After graduating from high school at the top of his class, he studied Russian Literature in Leningrad for two years and passed the Soviet State Exam for Teachers of Russian as a Foreign Language. Florian holds an MA Oxon from his studies in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at Oxford University (New College). He holds a diploma in Film Directing from the University of Television and Film in Munich.

He is the younger son of Leo-Ferdinand Graf Henckel von Donnersmarck, a former President of the German division of the Order of Malta, and Anna Maria von Berg. He holds German and Austrian citizenship. His uncle, Gregor Henckel-Donnersmarck, is a Cistercian abbot at Heiligenkreuz Abbey in the Vienna Woods, where Florian spent a month writing the first draft of The Lives of Others (German: Das Leben der Anderen).

Henckel von Donnersmarck is married to Christiane Asschenfeldt, the former International Executive Director of Creative Commons. They have three children:...
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