Two days prior to the Nobel prize award ceremonies, the cinematic adaptation of the personal bond between Bertha von Suttner and Alfred Nobel will premiere on TV. The Austrian Television Fund (FERNSEHFONDS AUSTRIA) provided EUR 884,441 for the production – this equals 20% of the overall production costs amounting to EUR 4.5 million. The film was produced by MONA Film in co-operation with Tivoli Film.
It will be broadcast on ORF 2 on 8 December 2014, at 8:15 pm. ARD will show the film on 3 January 2015, at 8:15 pm.
Based on the play „Mr. & Mrs. Nobel”, the film „Eine Liebe für den Frieden“ tells the story of Alfred Nobel and Bertha von Suttner. The two of them meet when she – still unmarried and called Bertha von Kinsky – accepts a position as Alfred Nobel’s private secretary in Paris. It is only for a short time that she works for Nobel, the inventor of dynamite. Soon after, she leaves Paris to marry Arthur von Suttner. She and Alfred Nobel, however, enter into an intense exchange of letters, forging a strong personal bond. Without this bond, the Nobel prize may never have existed.
Austrian actors among the cast are Birgit Minichmayr in the leading role as Bertha von Suttner and Philipp Hochmair as Arthur von Suttner. Alfred Nobel is impersonated by Sebastian Koch. The film was shot, among other locations, at Attersee Lake, Goldegg Castle as well as numerous venues in Vienna: the Hotel Sacher, the Schönbrunn Palace Gardens, the Austrian Parliament, the Academy of Fine Arts and the French embassy.
The Austrian Television Fund (FERNSEHFONDS AUSTRIA), established at RTR, is the largest funding agency for television productions in Austria. Funding is provided for the production of television films, series and documentaries with a clearly recognizable economic reference to Austria by production companies with business premises or a branch in Austria. The Austrian federal government makes available an annual budget of EUR 13.5 million. Additional information about the Austrian Television Fund can be found at www.fernsehfonds.at.