Christine Maria Kaufmann (born January 11, 1945) is a German actress. In 1961 she won the Golden Globe Award for New Star Of The Year - Actress, the only German to be so honoured.
Born to a German father and a French mother in Lengdorf, Styria, Kaufmann became a ballerina at the Munich Opera. She started her film career at the age of seven in the 1952 adaptation of Im weißen Rößl (White Horse Inn). The film which brought her fame was Rosen-Resli, released in 1954, when she was only nine. She gained international recognition when she starred with Steve Reeves in The Last Days of Pompeii (1959) and with Kirk Douglas in Town Without Pity (1961). The following year she appeared in Escape from East Berlin.
In 1963 Kaufmann married Tony Curtis, whom she had met during the filming of Taras Bulba (1962). They had two daughters, Alexandra (born July 19, 1964) and Allegra (born July 11, 1966). They divorced in 1968. Kaufmann resumed her career, which she had interrupted during her marriage.
Kaufmann is also a successful businesswoman, promoting her own cosmetics products line that sells well in Germany. She has written several books about beauty and health, as well as two autobiographies. She speaks three languages: German, English, and French.
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