Karin Dor (; born Kätherose Derr; 22 February 1938 – 6 November 2017) was a German actress. She was famous to international audiences for her role as

Bond girl A Bond girl is a character who is a love interest, female companion or (occasionally) an adversary of James Bond in a novel, film, or video game. Bond girls occasionally have names that are double entendres or sexual puns, such as Plenty O' ...

Helga Brandt in the

James Bond film James Bond is a fictional character created by British novelist Ian Fleming in 1953. A British secret agent working for MI6 under the codename 007, Bond has been portrayed on film in twenty-seven productions by actors Sean Connery, David Niv ...

'' You Only Live Twice'' (1967) and her appearance in the

Alfred Hitchcock Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock (13 August 1899 – 29 April 1980) was an English film director. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema. In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 featu ...

thriller ''

Topaz Topaz is a silicate mineral made of aluminium, aluminum and fluorine with the chemical formula aluminium, Alsilicon, Sioxygen, O(fluorine, F, hydroxide, OH). It is used as a gemstone in jewelry and other adornments. Common topaz in its natural ...

'' (1969).

Biography

Dor was born in

Wiesbaden Wiesbaden (; ) is the capital of the German state of Hesse, and the second-largest Hessian city after Frankfurt am Main. With around 283,000 inhabitants, it is List of cities in Germany by population, Germany's 24th-largest city. Wiesbaden form ...

on 22 February 1938. She starred in the

James Bond The ''James Bond'' franchise focuses on James Bond (literary character), the titular character, a fictional Secret Intelligence Service, British Secret Service agent created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels ...

movie '' You Only Live Twice'' (1967) and the

movie ''

'' (1969). She appeared in German movies adapted from the works of

Edgar Wallace Richard Horatio Edgar Wallace (1 April 1875 – 10 February 1932) was a British writer of crime and adventure fiction. Born into poverty as an illegitimate London child, Wallace left school at the age of 12. He joined the army at age 21 and was ...

(Krimis from Kriminalfilm) and

Karl May Karl Friedrich May ( , ; 25 February 1842 – 30 March 1912) was a German author. He is best known for his novels of travels and adventures, set in the American Old West, the Orient, the Middle East, Latin America, China and Germany. He als ...

. These two-film series were mainly directed by

Harald Reinl Harald Reinl (8 July 1908 in Bad Ischl, Austria – 9 October 1986 in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Spain) was an Austrian film director. He is known for the films he made based on Edgar Wallace and Karl May books (see Karl May movies and Edgar Wallace ...

, her first husband. In 2008, she was in a Munich stage production, ''Man liebt nur dreimal'' ("You Only Love Thrice"). In later years, she performed mainly stage roles but still appeared in some films. She was married three times: her last marriage was to George Robotham, an American

stunt A stunt is an unusual, difficult, dramatic physical feat that may require a special skill, performed for artistic purposes usually for a public audience, as on television or in theaters or cinema. Stunts are a feature of many action films. Befo ...

director, from 1988 until his death in 2007. The couple lived in Los Angeles and Munich. Her previous marriage was to

(1954–68); the couple had a child. In 1954, the year of their marriage, Dor was 16 years old (born 1938), while Reinl was 46 (born 1908).

Accident and death

In July 2016, while vacationing in

South Tyrol South Tyrol ( , ; ; ), officially the Autonomous Province of Bolzano – South Tyrol, is an autonomous administrative division, autonomous provinces of Italy, province in northern Italy. Together with Trentino, South Tyrol forms the autonomo ...

, Dor was knocked to the ground after being accidentally rammed by a woman with a pushchair. The backwards fall onto concrete resulted in a gashing 4-cm head wound that had to be stitched in hospital.Lind, Benjamin (10 June 2017)
Concerns about Bond-Girl Karin Dor
''The Bond Bulletin''. She lost her memory for the duration of an hour. According to Dor, the doctors detected neither a brain concussion nor an intracranial injury. Only during rehearsals for the theatre play '' Der Dressierte Mann'' weeks after her fall did doctors realize her injuries were more serious than previously thought, as she began suffering from headaches and was often tired. Even months past the accident, the aftereffects were still present and Dor was not feeling up to her usual energetic self. Her attitude however remained positive and, despite her doctors advising against it, she continued working as an actress. Between October and November 2016, she appeared on stage every evening performing at the Komödie im Bayerischen Hof in Munich. By that time, she was already experiencing limited motor function in her right leg. Suddenly, in January 2017, she relapsed. Her condition rapidly worsened in March 2017 and she was confined to a care home, where she ultimately died on 6 November, aged 79.

Selected filmography

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Dor, Karin 1938 births 2017 deaths German film actresses German stage actresses Actresses from Wiesbaden 20th-century German actresses 21st-century German actresses Actors from Hesse-Nassau