Tilly Lauenstein
Description
Tilly Lauenstein was a German actress and voice actress whose extensive career included significant contributions to anime dubbing for German-language audiences. Born Mathilde Dorothea Lauenstein on July 28, 1916, in Bad Homburg vor der Höhe, Germany, she began her performance career on stage at age eighteen in Stuttgart, later performing at major theaters such as the Deutsches Theater in Berlin. Her on-screen film and television career spanned from the late 1940s into the early 2000s, including appearances in popular German television series of the 1960s.
As a voice actress, Lauenstein was exceptionally prolific, providing German dubbing voices for hundreds of films and a wide array of characters in animated series and audio dramas. Her work in the anime genre is anchored by her role as Apolodria in the 1971 Japanese animated feature Cleopatra (original title Kureopatora), directed by Osamu Tezuka. In the German dubbed version produced in Berlin in 1972, she voiced the character Apolodria, a role originally performed by Kotoe Hatsui in Japanese. In another notable anime credit, she provided the German voice for Fräulein Rottenmeier in the classic anime adaptation of Heidi.
Beyond anime, Lauenstein was renowned as the long-standing German dubbing voice for several major Hollywood actresses. For decades, she was the standard German voice for Katharine Hepburn and Ingrid Bergman, and also dubbed performances by Simone Signoret, Lauren Bacall, Bette Davis, Marlene Dietrich in her English-speaking roles, Deborah Kerr, Barbara Stanwyck, and Susan Hayward. Her vocal work extended into popular children's entertainment, where she voiced characters such as the witch Mania in the Bibi Blocksberg audio dramas and the owl Ula in the Xanti series. One of her final voice acting roles was providing the German voice for Gloria Stuart in the film Titanic.
Tilly Lauenstein passed away on May 8, 2002, in Potsdam, Germany. Her career demonstrates the vital role of German dubbing artists in bringing international animation and film to German-speaking audiences, with her work in Osamu Tezuka's Cleopatra marking a key entry in the history of German-language anime dubbing.
As a voice actress, Lauenstein was exceptionally prolific, providing German dubbing voices for hundreds of films and a wide array of characters in animated series and audio dramas. Her work in the anime genre is anchored by her role as Apolodria in the 1971 Japanese animated feature Cleopatra (original title Kureopatora), directed by Osamu Tezuka. In the German dubbed version produced in Berlin in 1972, she voiced the character Apolodria, a role originally performed by Kotoe Hatsui in Japanese. In another notable anime credit, she provided the German voice for Fräulein Rottenmeier in the classic anime adaptation of Heidi.
Beyond anime, Lauenstein was renowned as the long-standing German dubbing voice for several major Hollywood actresses. For decades, she was the standard German voice for Katharine Hepburn and Ingrid Bergman, and also dubbed performances by Simone Signoret, Lauren Bacall, Bette Davis, Marlene Dietrich in her English-speaking roles, Deborah Kerr, Barbara Stanwyck, and Susan Hayward. Her vocal work extended into popular children's entertainment, where she voiced characters such as the witch Mania in the Bibi Blocksberg audio dramas and the owl Ula in the Xanti series. One of her final voice acting roles was providing the German voice for Gloria Stuart in the film Titanic.
Tilly Lauenstein passed away on May 8, 2002, in Potsdam, Germany. Her career demonstrates the vital role of German dubbing artists in bringing international animation and film to German-speaking audiences, with her work in Osamu Tezuka's Cleopatra marking a key entry in the history of German-language anime dubbing.