Carmen-Maja Antoni was born August 23, 1945, as the daughter of the artists couple Joseph Antoni and Ursula Antoni-Orendt in Berlin. Already at the age of eleven, she appeared for the first time on GDR television as one of three members of the pioneer cabaret revue "Blaue Blitze", directed by Gisela Schwartz-Martell. After finishing school, she attended drama school at Deutsche Hochschule für Filmkunst Potsdam-Babelsberg from 1962 to 1965, and during that time already became a cast member at Potsdam's Hans-Otto-Theater. She performed in fairy tales, classic German plays, and plays by Bertolt Brecht.

From 1970 on, she performed at Berlin's Volksbühne for five years and then went on to play at Berliner Ensemble where she still performed after the German reunification and under new management. Her repertoire included Molière, Shakespeare, Lessing, and Heiner Müller, among others. Time and time again, she celebrated success with Brechtian plays – even in Western Europe and the United States during the 1980s. At the same time, Antoni also thrilled audiences in a completely different theatre genre: by doing vocals and artistical show pieces in musical theatre.

Carmen-Maja Antoni's movie career with DEFA started at the same time as her theatre career during the 1960s. At first, she starred in smaller, mostly nameless, roles. She made her movie debut in 1964 in the comedy "Der Reserveheld" which was followed by Kurt Maetzig's "Das Kaninchen bin ich" (I Am the Rabbit), "Hauptmann Florian von der Mühle", starring Manfred Krug, and "Zeit der Störche", directed by Siegfried Kühn. In Herrmann Zschoche's science fiction film "Eolomea", Antoni dubbed the voice of the computer, and in the rather pubertal comedy "Der Mann, der nach der Oma kam", Antoni played an insurance cashier.

Antoni also regularly returned to the genre of children's films. She often played the role of the mother, for instance in "Der Dicke und ich", in "Die dicke Tilla", or in "Jeder träumt von einem Pferd". Furthermore, she played fairy tale characters such as the eponymous misfortune in "Verflixtes Mißgeschick". The leading role in Siegfried Kühn's film "Kindheit" (1987) became one of her best-known roles. In "Kindheit", Antoni played the caring grandmother of nine-year old Alfons, who is growing up in a Silesian village in 1944. Carmen-Maja Antoni won the critic’s award as "Best actress" for her performance.

After the German reunification, Antoni continued her theatre and film career without any noticeable interruption. In the TV crime series "Rosa Roth" , Antoni was seen as the secretary of the female inspector, played by Iris Berben. She also starred in minor parts in films such as "Das Leben ist eine Baustelle" ("Life is All You Get"), directed by Wolfgang Becker, Andreas Dresen's "Nachtgestalten" ("Night Shapes"), and "Berlin Is In Germany", directed by Hannes Stöhr, that saw Antoni as a friendly parole officer who helps the main protagonist to find his way in unified Germany after his release from jail. Most recently, Antoni was seen in the drama "Die Boxerin" ("About a Girl"), directed by Catharina Deus.

Besides her acting career, Carmen-Maja Antoni works as lecturer at HFF "Konrad Wolf" in Potsdam-Babelsberg and at Hochschule für Schauspielkunst "Ernst Busch". She is living with her family in Berlin.

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