His film Desperado City (1981) won the Golden Camera in Cannes (1981). Member of the jury at the Berlin International Film Festival 1989. After abandoning his studies, he worked as a sailor, taxi driver, drummer and journalist in Hamburg. Played at the Schauspielhaus in Hamburg under Gustaf Gründgens. Made his "acting" debut in Immensee (1943), a movie by the infamous Nazi propaganda director Veit Harlan, when he was eight months old (1942).
