Nadja Tiller

Nadja Tiller (16 March 1929 – 21 February 2023) was an Austrian actress in film, television, and on stage. She was one of the most popular German-speaking actresses in the international cinema of the 1950s and 1960s, receiving international recognition when she played the title role in the 1958 film Das Mädchen Rosemarie (Rosemary) in 1958, shown at the Venice Film Festival. It opened the way to international films. She often played alongside her husband, Walter Giller.

Tiller was born in Vienna on 16 March 1929, the daughter of actor Anton Tiller of Vienna and his wife Erika née Körner [de] (1902–1979), an opera singer and actress from Danzig. She attended there a Realgymnasium secondary school. In 1945 she began her studies at the Max-Reinhardt-Seminar, which she later continued until 1949 at the Musik- und Schauspielakademie, studying dance, ballet, and acting. She became an ensemble member at the Theater in der Josefstadt in 1949. That year she won the Miss Austria competition, a national beauty pageant for unmarried women in Austria.

Tiller made her film debut, also in 1949, in Arthur de Glahs [de] 's Märchen vom Glück [de] (Good Luck Fairytale), opposite Hildegard Knef. In 1952, she starred opposite Inge Egger and O. W. Fischer in Eduard von Borsody's Ich hab' mich so an Dich gewöhnt [de]. She met her future husband Walter Giller in 1953; they became the German Traumpaar (dream couple) in many productions to come. Tiller had her artistic breakthrough in the 1955 film Die Barrings, directed by Rolf Thiele, alongside Lil Dagover, Ida Wüst, Paul Hartmann and Dieter Borsche.

In 1955, she acted opposite O. W. Fischer again in the film Ich suche Dich, based on a play by A. J. Cronin. Her international breakthrough role was Rosemarie Nitribitt in the 1958 German film Das Mädchen Rosemarie (Rosemary) in 1958, again directed by Thiele. The film was presented at the Venice Film Festival, and was awarded the Golden Globe the following year as the best foreign film. She then received offers for international productions, including from Antonioni for La notte, from Fellini for La dolce vita, and from Visconti for Rocco and His Brothers. She refused, naming family as a reason.

She actually played in Tendre voyou (Tender Scoundrel) opposite Jean-Paul Belmondo, and in Du rififi à Paname (The Upper Hand) opposite Jean Gabin, among others. She appeared in Rossellini's Anima nera (1962) and in The Poppy Is Also a Flower (1966) with Rita Hayworth and Angie Dickinson.

With Thiele, she appeared in films based on literature, including as Gerda Buddenbrook in The Buddenbrooks in 1959, based on Thomas Mann's novel; she matched the author's description as an "elegant, strange, captivating and enigmatic beauty". She played Lulu opposite Mario Adorf in 1962, followed by Schloß Gripsholm, after Tucholsky's novel, in 1963, and Tonio Kröger based on Mann's novella in 1964.

Tiller appeared in around 120 films, including several international productions. She performed with partners such as Curd Jürgens, Hansjörg Felmy, Yul Brynner, Robert Mitchum, Rod Steiger, and Jean Marais, and at the height of her career was considered along with Sophia Loren to be among the most alluring women in European film.

In 1967 and 1968, she appeared on the open stage at Salzburg Festival in the annual play, Hofmannsthal's Jedermann (Everyman), as the Buhlschaft. In the 1970s and 1980s, she had theatre engagements, at the Theater Lübeck from 1974 to 1976), in Berlin in 1980 and 1984, and Vienna in 1981. In both Lübeck and Vienna, she played the lead female role in Kurt Weill musical Lady in the Dark. She appeared in boulevard plays until the late 1990s, such as the role of the aging film diva Joan Crawford in Cas Enklaar [nl]'s Nächte mit Joan at the Hamburger Kammerspiele in 1997.