Sonja Ingrid Emilie Hanna Sutter, was born January 17, 1931, in Freiburg im Breisgau. Although her school education was shortened by the war, she still studied Greek and Latin and learned whole theatre plays by heart to fulfill her dream and become an actress. In 1950, she made her stage debut at Stadttheater Freiburg. She then performed at theatres in Stuttgart, Hamburg and Munich, where she became a regular cast member of Staatstheater for three years.

In 1959, Sonja Sutter went to the renowned Burgtheater in Vienna, where she performed for four decades and in the course of time starred in about 70 leading roles. She made celebrated performances as Lady Milford in Schiller's "Kabale und Liebe" ("Intrigue and Love"), as Helena in Goethe's "Faust II", or as Ursula in Sternheim's "Das Fossil". Besides her performances at Burgtheater, Sutter was regularly seen at Salzburger Festspiele and made guest appearances, for instance, in Hamburg, Zürich, and Bregenz.

Sutter started her movie career with the role of careless Renate in the DEFA production "Frauenschicksale" ("Destinies of Women", 1952), directed by Slatan Dudow. Luis Trenker had called Dudow's attention to the young actress after Sutter had attended a casting for one of Trenker's regional films. During the following years, Sutter successfully worked in both parts of Germany – a more than unusual movie career. After the success of "Frauenschicksale", Sutter starred in major West German productions, including Rolf Thiele's "Meines Vaters Pferde" (1954) and "Das Schweigen im Walde" (1955), directed by Helmut Weiß. For DEFA, Sutter appeared in films such as "Star mit fremden Federn" (1955), also starring Werner Peters.

Sutter's next big success with critics and movie goers alike was the multiple award-winning DEFA film "Lissy" (1957), directed by Konrad Wolf. In "Lissy", Sonja Sutter played a worker's daughter at the beginning of the 1930s, who marries an employee. When her husband joins the Nazis, Lissy, who is rather meek in the beginning, comes to realize during the course of the film that she has to separate from her husband. Sutter's last films in the GDR were Richard Groschopp's "Sie kannten sich alle" and Joachim Kunert's "Tatort Berlin" and "Der Lotterieschwede" (all 1958). The building of the Berlin Wall in 1961 effectively ended Sutter's film career in East Germany. When role offers for West German film productions did not contend her anymore, Sutter completely focused on her stage career.

From the 1970s on, Sutter was more and more often seen on TV. She starred in TV series such as "Heidi" (1978) and "Der Kommissar", and in TV movies like Hark Bohm's "Wir pfeifen auf den Gurkenkönig" (1976). During the 1980s and 1990s, she also made guest appearances in several episodes of the TV series "Der Alte" and "Derrick". Sutter ended her work for TV in 2005.

Besides her theatre work she also did readings and solo programs. In 2002 she was awarded the Golden "Ehrenzeichen für Verdienste um das Land Wien".

Sonja Sutter passed away in Baden, Niederösterreich on June 2nd, 2017.

The contents of this entry were funded with the support of the DEFA-Stiftung.