Mimi Pollak

Mimi Pollak (9 April 1903 – 11 August 1999) was a Swedish actress and theatre director.

Mini biography

Maria Helena Pollak was born in Hammarö, Värmland to Austrian-Jewish parents and was trained in the performing arts at the prestigious Dramatens elevskola (the Royal Dramatic Theatre's acting school) in Stockholm 1922-24.

Pollak worked in the 1920s and 1930s as a film acctress and as stage actress mainly on Helsingborg City Theatre and The Blanche Theatre, Stockholm, but she returned as an actress to Royal Dramatic Theatre (aka Dramaten) 1942.

Pollak became in 1948 the first contracted female director at the Dramaten with the production of Jean Genet's Jungfruleken (Les Bonnes/The Maids), starring Anita Björk and Maj-Britt Nilsson in the leads. Pollak became a very successful director at Dramaten and staged altogether 60 plays at the national stage over the years.

She appeared since her 1922 debut in the film Amatörfilmen in about 30 film and TV productions. Notable film roles are her supporting parts in Schamyl Bauman's film comedy Skolka skolan (1949), in Vilgot Sjöman's Klänningen (aka The Dress, 1964), in Ingmar Bergman's Autumn Sonata (starring Ingrid Bergman) as the piano teacher, in Flight of the Eagle (1982), starring Max von Sydow and directed by Jan Troell and in the very popular Swedish TV mystery Agnes Cecilia - en sällsam historia (1991), adapted from...
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