Leontine Sagan

Leontine Sagan (born Leontine Schlesinger; 13 February 1889 – 20 May 1974) was an Austrian-Hungarian theatre director and actress of Jewish descent. She is best known for directing Mädchen in Uniform (1931). Along with directing for both cinema and the stage, Sagan also acted in several films. She died in Pretoria, South Africa in 1974, at the age of 85. Personal life Born in either Budapest or Vienna in 1889, Sagan trained with Max Reinhardt, who is best known for his elaborate and imaginative sets and theatrics. In 1899, as a child, she moved to South Africa with her family just before the Second Boer War. She was educated in a German-language school in Johannesburg. In her later years, Sagan married publisher and writer Dr. Victor Fleischer; the union was childless. Career Sagan directed three films. She is best remembered for the first of two films she directed, Mädchen in Uniform (1931). It has an all-female cast and was ground-breaking not only for its portrayal of lesbian and pedagogical eros, but also for the production's co-operative and profit-sharing financial arrangements. Whether Sagan herself was a lesbian is unknown; the book Women Film Directors lists her as "lesbian film director" as she directed Christa Winsloe's play, said to contain lesbian themes.