Karl Markovics

Karl Markovics is an Austrian actor and film director born on August 29, 1963, in Vienna, Austria. He is widely recognized for his leading performance in the 2007 film The Counterfeiters, which received the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.

Raised in Vienna, Markovics was born to a mother who worked as a clerk and a father who was a bus driver. Supported by his parents, he chose to pursue a career in stage acting rather than entering a conventional profession. After failing the entry exam for the Max-Reinhardt-Seminar, he began performing at the Serapions Theater in Vienna and later joined the Wiener Ensemble in 1987.

Markovics made his film debut in 1991 with a role in Hund und Katz, followed by an appearance as an innkeeper in the 1993 tragic-comedy road movie Indien. He gained widespread recognition playing Ernst Stockinger in the Austrian crime show Inspector Rex. His character was later featured in the spin-off series Stockinger.

Over the course of his career, Markovics appeared in various screen projects, including Hinterholz 8, Late Show, Geboren in Absurdistan alongside Julia Stemberger, and the black comedy Komm, süßer Tod. He played far-right terrorist Franz Fuchs in the 2007 TV film Franz Fuchs - Ein Patriot, Ferdinand aus der Fünten in the 2012 Dutch film Süskind, Wolf in the 2014 comedy The Grand Budapest Hotel, and a supporting role in the German television series Babylon Berlin.

In addition to his screen roles, Markovics has performed extensively in television and theater, including productions at Viennese venues such as the Theater in der Josefstadt and the Wiener Volkstheater. At the Wiener Volkstheater, he directed his first play, Eugène Ionesco's The Bald Singer, in 2005. He also wrote and directed the 2011 film Atmen, and played the non-singing role of Samiel in a 2010 production of the opera Der Freischütz at Vienna's Theater an der Wien.

Markovics's primary professional achievement came with his starring role as Salomon Sorowitsch in Stefan Ruzowitzky's The Counterfeiters, which earned Austria its first-ever Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. He is married to actress Stephanie Taussig, with whom he has two children, Louis and Leonie. The family resides in Vienna, Austria.