George Bartenieff

George Michael Bartenieff (January 24, 1933 – July 30, 2022) was a German-born American stage and film actor. He was noted both for his character roles in commercial and non-commercial films and on television, and for his work in the avant-garde theatre and performance world of downtown Manhattan, New York City in the 1960s and 1970s. He was a co-founder of the Theatre for the New City, and of the Greenwich Village Halloween Parade. Bartenieff appeared in nine shows on Broadway, in 19 productions Off-Broadway, in 18 films, and in 21 television episodes for 14 different programs. He was the recipient of two Obie Awards and a Drama Desk Award. As of 2003, Bartenieff was also teaching at the City University of New York, and in a high school in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn. Life and career Bartenieff was born in Berlin, Germany, the son of dancer parents, Irmgard (Prim) and Michael Bartenieff. As his father was Jewish, his parents left for the U.S. with the rise of the Nazis, settling in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. Bartenieff and his brother Igor lived with his mother's relatives in the Bavarian mountains, before joining their parents in the U.S. He made his stage debut at the age of 14 in the 1947 Broadway theatre production The Whole World Over, directed by Harold Clurman. After appearing in a few shows on Broadway, Bartenieff went to London for training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, where he "fell in love" with the works of Shakespeare. His intention at the time was to be a classical actor, and his hero was Laurence Olivier.