Daniel Brühl

Personal life

Brühl was born in Barcelona, Spain. His father was the German Brazilian TV director Hanno Brühl, who was born in São Paulo, Brazil. His Spanish mother was a teacher. He also has a brother and a sister, Oliver and Miriam. Shortly after his birth, his family moved to Cologne, Germany, where he grew up and attended the Dreikönigsgymnasium. Brought up in a fully multilingual home, he speaks fluent German, English, Spanish, Catalan and French - and understands Portuguese.

In 2006 Brühl separated from his long-time girlfriend and later fiancée, actress Jessica Schwarz, whom he had met on the set of the 2001 film No Regrets. Since 2010, he has been in a relationship with psychologist Felicitas Rombold. They have a son, Anton (b. October 2016).

Career

Brühl began acting at a young age and made his acting debut in 1995 as street kid Benji in the soap opera Verbotene Liebe (Forbidden Love). His international breakthrough role came in 2003 as Alex Kerner in the Golden Globe-nominated film Good Bye, Lenin!, which reached an estimated six million cinema-goers worldwide. In 2003, Brühl won the European Film Academy award trophies for Best Actor (Critics/Audience Awards) for the role. Brühl made his English-speaking film debut in the 2004 Ladies in Lavender, starring alongside English actresses Judi Dench and Maggie Smith. The same year, he won the People's Choice trophy for Best Actor for the film Love in Thoughts while at the same time, he was nominated for Best Actor (critics) for The Edukators. Brühl featured as Lieutenant Horstmayer, a central character in the 2005 film Joyeux Noël, a trilingual World War One film based on the experiences of French, German and Scottish soldiers during the Christmas truce of 1914. The film shows Brühl's linguistic ability as he ably communicates in German, French and English throughout.

In 2006, he was invited to be part of the short film and Cinéfondation juries in the Cannes Film Festival. In June 2006, he made a cameo appearance in 2 Days in Paris, a romantic comedy film which was directed by French actress Julie Delpy. In September 2006 his Cannes-nominated film Salvador (Puig Antich) premiered in Spain. In the film he played Salvador Puig Antich, a Catalan anarchist executed during the Franco era. In 2007 he appeared in a small role in the film The Bourne Ultimatum. He was in Krabat, based on a popular German children's story, which premiered in German cinemas in October 2008.

He was introduced to mainstream U.S. audiences in the role of Frederik Zoller, a German war hero in Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds, starring Brad Pitt, which premiered at Cannes 2009. He, and his co-stars won the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. In 2009, he also starred in Julie Delpy's third directorial film The Countess.

In May 2009 Brühl decided to become active in a different field of filmmaking by launching the production company Fouronfilm together with Film1. Brühl starred in the 2010 British-Russian production In Transit where he played a young Nazi soldier opposite John Malkovich. He also co-starred with Clive Owen in the 2011 horror thriller Intruders, which was directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo.

In 2013, he co-starred in The Fifth Estate, a film based on the founding of WikiLeaks. Brühl played Daniel Domscheit-Berg, alongside Benedict Cumberbatch as Julian Assange. In the same year, Brühl portrayed former Formula 1 driver Niki Lauda in the Ron Howard biographical film Rush. The film was a commercial and critical success, and for his role he received multiple award nominations including the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor, Critic's Choice Award for Best Supporting Actor, Screen Actors Guild Award and the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.

In 2015, he starred in Colonia, a thriller by Academy Award-winner Florian Gallenberger. The film was shot October to December 2014 in South America, Germany and Luxembourg. His co-stars are Emma Watson and Michael Nyqvist, and the film was produced by Academy Award-nominee Benjamin Herrmann. Brühl then played Helmut Zemo in Captain America: Civil War, released in spring 2016.

Awards

Nominations