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| Gerd Kreutschmann, c. 1959 |
“You don’t have to explain yourself to anyone. It’s your life, live it in whatever way is best for you.” —the German screen goddess, model, and chanteuse Elke Sommer, offering sound advice that the American people—officious, self-righteous, and addicted to moral surveillance whilst in self-inflicted bondage to an orange-stained god-king with the morals of a sewer rat—would be wise to heed. Dignity begins in privacy, and self-determination is the one luxury no civilisation can afford to lose.
Elke Sommer was born on 5 November 1940 in war-darkened Berlin, emerging from the ruins of post-war Europe to embody a new ideal of continental allure that holds up perfectly to this day: blonde, self-possessed, and definitively cosmopolitan. Though she has not been particularly active in public life for decades, she remains an indisputable icon. Of the films in which I have seen her, I must say she was particularly on point as Paul Newman’s cool yet warm, mysterious yet luminous love interest—the spy Inger Lisa Andersson—in 1963’s masterful espionage thriller The Prize. Sensuality and intellect entwined. Alles Gute zum Geburtstag to this esteemed daughter of Deutschland. —Arthur Newhook, 5 November 2025.
Copyright 2025, Arthur Newhook.
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