Gert van den Bergh

Gert van den Bergh (b. Krugersdorp, 16/10/1920 – d. Cape Town, 16/02/1968) was a stage, film and radio actor.

Biography

Gert Nicolaas van den Bergh started his acting career as a member of the Krugersdorp Municipal Dramatic and Operatic Society. There his work was spotted by Anna Neethling-Pohl, who brought him into the Volksteater. They also arranged a couple of benefit performances to raise money to enable him to study at the University of Pretoria. He appeared in several plays for the Volksteater and in 1943 spent one year with Hendrik and Mathilde Hanekom. Thereafter he acted with the Pierre De Wet Toneelgeselskap, followed by work for the National Theatre Organisation.

As early as 1942 he appeared in his first film, namely Die Lig van ‘n Eeu, directed by Andries A. Pienaar, better known as the writer Sangiro. Subsequently he acted in movies by Pierre de Wet, including film versions of the plays Pinkie (Pinkie se Erfenis/1946) and Die Goeie Oue Tyd (Simon Beyers/1947). These were followed by two films for Bladon Peake and, despite frequent radio work (he was South Africa’s first freelance radio broadcaster), it is through a wide range of films that he became known as one of the country’s foremost and reliable actors. As he got older, he gained a certain gravitas that stood him in good stead in one of his last roles as the Chairman of the Stigting Adriaan Delport in Jans Rautenbach’s Die Kandidaat (1968).

He was married twice, first to Erna Eksteen, who had acted with him in Nag Het die Wind Gebring at the NTO, and later to actress Dulcie Smit, who afterwards took the stage name of Dulcie van den Bergh. Their son, film actor/director Regardt van den Bergh, was born in 1952. Actresses Lika van den Bergh and Leán van den Bergh are his granddaughters. He died unexpectedly of a heart attack at the early age of 47.

Sources

See Du Toit, 1988 [TH, JH]

Nag het die Wind Gebring programme notes, 1948.

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