Friedl Behn-Grund was born in Bad Polzin (now Polczyn-Zdrój, Poland) on August 26, 1906. In 1924, he started as an assistant to the UFA cinematographer Erich Waschneck. One year later, Behn-Grund worked as the director of photography for Waschneck’s directorial debut, Kampf um die Scholle.

Werner Bergemann was born in Wendisch Bork in Brandenburg, Germany, on August 4, 1930. He trained as an industrial clerk in his early life and later as a men’s tailor. In 1952, he became an assistant costume designer at the DEFA Studio for Feature Films. By 1958 he was lead costume designer on his own projects.

Ruth Berghaus was born in Dresden on July 2, 1927. She studied dance and choreography with Gret Palucca, a Mary Wigman student and member of the Bauhaus movement, before attending advanced classes at the German Academy of the Arts in Berlin. Like the opera directors Joachim Herz and Götz Friedrich, she was a student of Walter Felsenstein and influenced by Brechtian ideas.

Werner Bergmann was born in Niederkaina, Germany on January 14, 1921. After an apprenticeship as an industrial and portrait photographer, he worked as a lab and lighting technician and as a camera assistant at the Boehner Film company in Dresden.

Frank Beyer, one of the most important German directors of the postwar period, directed some of Germany’s most powerful and historically significant films. Born in Nobitz, Germany, on May 26, 1932, he first studied drama in Berlin, before transferring to the famed Prague Film School (FAMU), where he studied directing alongside Miloš Forman and other promising Czechoslovakian directors.

Hermann Beyer was born on May 30, 1943 in Altenburg, Germany, the younger brother of the internationally known director Frank Beyer. He studied at the Academy of Performing Arts in Berlin from 1963 to 1966. His first theater engagements were at the Maxim Gorki Theater in Berlin and at the Hans Otto Theater in Potsdam (1969-1971).

Monica Bielenstein was born in 1948 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where her Swiss parents had emigrated in 1935. While her father was a diplomat in East Germany, she studied acting at the Ernst Busch Academy for Performing Arts in Berlin from 1966 to 1970.

Paul Bildt was born on May 19, 1885 in Berlin, where he took acting classes with Friedrich Moest at the Reicher Academy for Performing Arts. His debut as an actor in 1905 was with a touring theater company in Hanover in 1905 and theater engagements followed in Leipzig and Dresden.

Renate Blume was born in 1944 in Bad Wildungen. As a twelve-year-old she joined the famous Gret Palucca ballet school in Dresden. Although her parents wanted her to became a doctor, she secretly applied to the Academy for Performing Arts in Berlin.

Christel Bodenstein was born in Munich, Germany, on October 13, 1938. From 1952 to 1955, she trained at the Leipzig School of Ballet and at the Berlin Ballet School. Her first engagement was at the Landestheater in Halle. From 1956 to 1959, she then studied acting at the Deutsche Hochschule für Filmkunst (now Filmuniversität Babelsberg Konrad Wolf) in Potsdam-Babelsberg.