Born in Braunschweig, Lower Saxony, Bibiana Beglau is the daughter of a border guard and a nurse. After training as an actor at the University of Music and Theatre in Hamburg, she worked with Einar Schleef, Christoph Schlingensief and Falk Richter, among others.
She became known for her leading role in Volker Schlöndorff's film The Legend of Rita, for which she was awarded the Silver Bear for Best Actress at the 2000 Berlin Film Festival and nominated for the European Film Prize. In 2000 she was awarded the Ulrich Wildgruber Prize. In 2004, Bibiana Beglau was again screened in The Ninth Day directed by Volker Schlöndorff, alongside Ulrich Matthes and August Diehl. For her acting performance, as a mother trying to hide a cruel secret Bibiana Beglau received the Adolf Grimme Prize in 2007 for Under the Ice [de] together with director Aelrun Goette and cameraman Jens Harant.
Bibiana Beglau at the awards for the Deutscher Fernsehpreis in 2012
Since 1996 she has repeatedly played leading roles in leading theatres in the German-speaking world. She has worked at the Burgtheater Vienna, the Schaubühne Berlin, the Schauspielhaus Zurich, the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus, the Thalia Theater Hamburg and the Volksbühne Berlin. The performance of Nothing hurts at the Kampnagelfabrik was invited to the Berlin Theatertreffen in 2000. [2]
In 2005 she played the role of Kunigunde in Martin Kušej's production of König Ottokars Glück und Ende at the Burgtheater, which was invited to the Salzburg Festival, and in 2008 she played Lady Macbeth in Sebastian Nübling's Shakespeare production at the Schauspielhaus Zurich.
She was a member of the ensemble at the Thalia Theater in Hamburg from 2009 to 2011. There she played the role of Rose Kennedy in Luk Perceval's "The truth about the Kennedys" and in Dimiter Gotscheff's productions Antigone and Oedipus, Tyrant in the three roles of "Kreon", "Teiresias" as well "the Messenger". Under Dimiter Gotscheffs she also took part in the world premiere of Peter Handke's play "Immer noch Sturm" at the Salzburg Festival. Until 2012, she could be seen at the Schaubühne and the Volksbühne Berlin, among others in 4.48 Psychose by Sarah Kane or Berlin Alexanderplatz by Alfred Döblin. In both plays she played one of the female leading roles for over 10 years.
From 2011 to 2019 she was a member of the ensemble at the Munich Residenztheater, where she also played three roles as Erna, Rosa and Schürzinger in Frank Castorf's production of Kasimir und Karoline von Ödön von Horváth. In 2012 she won the Kurt Meisel Prize for her portrayal of Petra von Kant in Die bitteren Tränen der Petra von Kant by Rainer Werner Fassbinder at the Munich Residenztheater under the direction of Martin Kušej. Since the 2019/20 season Bibiana Beglau has been a member of the ensemble of the Burgtheater Vienna, whose director is Martin Kušej.
Bibiana Beglau is also active as an audio book narrator. She has worked with Falk Richter's Gott ist ein DJ and has repeatedly lent her voice to audio book productions about Annemarie Schwarzenbach.
2003 - 2004: 57 Minuten 38 Sekunden Ewigkeit - '57 Minutes and 38 Seconds of Eternity'asVerschollene by Bibiana Beglau and Stefan Jäger at Schauspielhaus Zürich (Director: Stefan Jäger)
