Karl Friedrich Cerf

Karl Friedrich Cerf (actually Frederick Hirsch - Cerf [fr deer ] was his stage name ) ( born February 27, 1771 in sub - Eisenheim, district of Würzburg, † November 6, 1845 in Berlin) was a German theater director. He founded and led the first private sector Theater in Berlin, the Royal City Theatre since 1824.

Cerf came from a Jewish family, converted early to Christianity and worked in Dessau in traditional Jewish profession of horse dealers. He succeeded in the ascent to an important military function ( Oberkriegscommissär ). In the wars of liberation against Napoleon, he was able to prove itself under Ludwig Adolph Peter Graf zu Sayn -Wittgenstein, so he was honored by the Tsar Alexander I..

Cerf settled in Berlin and received by the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm III. the license for the use of a theater, which he ran until his death. The Royal City Theatre was the first private sector " popular theater " in Berlin. Its shareholders were about the bankers Jacob Herz Beer (the father of the composer Giacomo Meyerbeer ) or Alexander Mendelssohn Bankhaus Mendelssohn.

However, market, economic success and the emancipation of a German non- courtly theater could not be connect as some ( such as Ludwig Tieck ) had hoped. The house remained dependent on courtly grants. Cerf had to take Italian operas and French comedies in the Schedule, which was resented in some quarters. On the other hand he managed the creation of a local Berlin Posse with stars such as the actor Friedrich Beckmann.

1829 the theater was already insolvent and the shareholders left it to the concessionaire Cerf, who continued it on their own account, with the support of the court.

Critics with potentially anti-Semitic tendency referred to him as a front man of the court and as one of the art and the artists blankly opposing manager. Similar be treated with caution judgments are, however, known about the successful Viennese theater producer Carl Carl.

His son Rudolf Cerf inherited the license for the King Municipal Theatre and transferred them since 1852 on various other buildings. He became as dazzling Berlin theater founder and entrepreneur famous in the second half of the 19th century.