“The Old One” star Rolf Schimpf: Berlin actor celebrates 100th birthday

He was the old one. For 21 years, Rolf Schimpf played the chief detective Leo Kress in the ZDF series “Der Alte”. After 222 episodes it was over: Leo Kress retired at the age of 65. Schimpf was already 83 at the time. If you like, “The Old Man” became the actor’s second self, his biological alter ego so to speak, because he has indeed become very old. Today, November 14th, Rolf Schimpf celebrates his 100th birthday.

Age always played a big role in his life. He only became really known, even famous, in the second half of his life. The native of Berlin and the son of a naval officer, whose ancestors include the Swabian composer Christian Fink (1831-1911), had previously played mainly supporting roles in TV series such as “Harbour Hospital” (1968), “Soko Munich” (1978-1986) or ” “The Black Forest Clinic” (1986), also appeared in “Tatort” seven times.

He actually wanted to become a doctor, but couldn’t get a place at university and, after the Second World War and commercial training at the Hengstenberg vinegar company, he found his way into the theater. “That was it, I knew where I belonged,” he said later.

He graduated from an acting school in Stuttgart and went to the theater and appeared on renowned stages such as the Württembergisches Staatstheater Stuttgart and the Hamburger Kammerspiele. He had his first major leading role in the satirical TV film “The Sheriff of Linsenbach” in 1983. Producer Helmut Ringelmann (1926-2011) liked his calm and level-headed manner so much that he gave him the title role in his ZDF six-part series ” Mensch Bachmann” (1984). Then Schimpf turned 60.

Two years later, Ringelmann cast him in the leading role in “The Old One”. Schimpf embodied a fatherly-looking police officer, just as he himself is as a private person.

“I wanted to be who I am,” “. “I imagined I was a detective and how I would react now, how I would behave, how I would deal with my colleagues, how I would deal with the suspects how would I behave if I had convicted someone. All of this corresponds to the way I would deal with people.” He found the murder and manslaughter phase of his professional life, which lasted over 20 years, to be “a very harmonious time”; he felt “very comfortable” in this role.

Nobody could tell that the actor Schimpf had long since passed the retirement age for detectives. He finally quit in 2006. “There are decisions that you make with your heart and decisions that are made with your head. This is one of the latter. It had to be, I want it to appear believable when I play a commissioner. That’s why I think it’s right now to stop it,” said Rolf Schimpf to “Bild am Sonntag”.

“We respect his decision, but we are sad,” said ZDF program director Thomas Bellut. It was a bit of a shock for TV viewers that “The Old One” now had a different face, his colleague Walter Kreye (82), who was 18 years his junior ) became Schimpf’s successor. He was followed by Jan-Gregor Kremp (62). Thomas Heintze (60), the fifth actor, is now acting as “The Old Man”; the first was Siegfried Lowitz (1914-1999).

Rolf Schimpf appeared again in 2009 as retired Leo Kress in the episode “Taxi Murderer” in the successful crime series; after all, he also retired as an actor in 2010 after more than 120 films and TV productions. In the same year he moved with his second wife, the actress Ilse Zielstorff (1935-2015), to the comfortable Augustinum retirement home in Munich.

Age hasn’t gone well for Rolf Schimpf in recent years. His wife, the love of his life, became demented. “She didn’t recognize the nurses, didn’t want to be washed, thrashed around and just shouted: ‘Who are you?'” . At some point there was no longer an alternative. His wife Ilse needed more and more intensive care, which she didn’t want to allow. That only worked in a nursing home. Rolf Schimpf decided to take this step with a heavy heart.

Once a week he visited his wife, who lived in her own world. “It was a constant rollercoaster of emotions: bright moments with tenderness and laughter, then a shoe flies into the small of your back or there is a hail of blows,” . “I’m happy when she recognizes me. She doesn’t speak. Only her looks show it. I feed her and we hold hands.” The journeys home on the bus were particularly difficult. “I’m sitting in a very deep hole and crying for my wife, who is still there and actually no longer.”

Ilse Zielstorff died on May 25, 2015 at the age of 79. Schimpf didn’t get over her death. In an interview on his 95th birthday, he said how much he missed his “Ille”. He wasn’t doing particularly well himself either. “My knees don’t support me anymore. I’m glad I have a family-owned cane to help me. After an eye operation, it’s easier for me to see again. Hearing: sometimes better, sometimes bad. I’m still fit in my brain. But man I have to say: growing old is no walk in the park.”

This situation has worsened, even significantly. Rolf Schimpf now also suffers from dementia. In addition, in 2023, after 13 years, he had to leave his small two-room apartment in the Augustinum because he could no longer afford the costs for the seniors’ residence. According to “Bunte” he had paid 5,700 euros a month (including care services) and now his savings had been used up.

His medical supervisor explained in “Bild” that Schimpf himself had wanted to move to another home that cost 2,500 euros less per month. “He is being well cared for in his new home. He has very poor hearing and vision, has dementia and needs care.”

Fellow actress Jutta Kammann (80), who used to be on stage and in front of the camera with Schimpf and has been his friend for decades, visited him in his new home – and was horrified: his new room was clean, but “a Detention station. Rolf sits in a wheelchair and looks at the wall. He has neither a television nor a radio in his eleven square meter room, which has a special nursing bed, a bedside table and a built-in desk. Schimpf kept asking her why he was here; everything had been fine before.

Jutta Kammann, who lives in the Augustinum herself, describes in “Bild” that she was in tears when she visited the “old man”: “The fact that Rolf, despite dementia, notices how miserable he lives there and doesn’t understand why he is there “It breaks my heart.”