Rudolf Schanzer


Rudolf Schanzer was an Austrian playwright and journalist. He is primarily known for the numerous operetta librettos that he wrote for composers such as Leo Fall, Jean Gilbert, Emmerich Kálmán, and Ralph Benatzky. He was born in Vienna and died in Italy where he committed suicide after his arrest by the Gestapo.

Life and career

Schanzer was born into a Jewish family in Vienna where his father worked as a shipping agent. From 1894 to 1895 he studied law at the University of Vienna and then went to Paris where he worked as a private secretary and journalist. After Paris, he settled in Berlin working there as a journalist, critic, and editor for the . He also began writing theatrical pieces in his spare time. Some of his earliest works were for pantomimes and cabaret and variety shows. He then began collaborating on operetta librettos with his friends and fellow writers Rudolf Bernauer and Ernst Welisch. Their success led him to becoming a full-time librettist.
During the course of his career he would write or co-write over 30 operetta and musical theatre librettos, many of which were later made into films. With the rise of Nazi Germany and the enactment of the antisemitic Nuremberg Laws in 1935, Schanzer left Berlin and moved to his villa in the Austrian spa town of Bad Ischl. He returned to Vienna in 1936, but following the German annexation of Austria in 1938, he fled to Abbazia, a town now in Croatia but then under Italian control. He tried to emigrate to the US or England but was unsuccessful. Schanzer was arrested by the Gestapo in 1944 and was to be deported to a concentration camp. He committed suicide while in custody by taking the poison which he had always carried with him after his flight from Austria.

Librettos

Librettos written or co-written by Schanzer include: