Who is Vigo the Carpathian?
Vigo was an ancient 16th century medieval tyrant and sorceress who died in the 17th century. He is the main antagonist of Ghostbusters II, portrayed on-screen by Wilhelm von Homburg and voiced by Max von Sydow. He finds himself in Ghostbusters: The Video Game, re-voiced by Von Sydow.
Vigo is also known as Prince Vigo Von Homburg Deutschendorf, Scourge of Carpathia, Sorrow of Moldavia, Vigo the Carpathian, Vigo the Cruel, Vigo the Torturer, Vigo the Despised, and Vigo the Unholy.
Vigo was born in 1505 as a prince in a small Carpathian kingdom in the Balkans. He quickly rose to power and ruled his homeland with an iron fist. Thanks to his despotic rule, the country itself was in a constant state of mental turmoil, earning him the infamous nickname ‘Scourge of Carpathia’.
Vigo later conquered another country, the Romanian country of Moldova. Moldova was still resentful of the psychopathic dictator, but he gave his people another infamous alias, ‘Sorrow of Moldavia’. He is said to be a powerful magician and a genius in many ways, as well as a tyrant, dictator, madman and genocidal madman.
Who Played as Vigo the Carpathian?
German actor Norbert Grupe, better known as Wilhelm von Homburg, portrayed Vigo the Carpathian, a dictatorial sorcerer whose soul was freed from medieval paintings, in Ghostbusters II. Best known today.
In reality, Carpathian Vigo never existed. Invented by Ghostbusters authors Harold Ramis and Dan Aykroyd, Vigo got its nickname from the Carpathian Mountains of Europe and was inspired by the bloodthirsty 15th-century Romanian ruler Vlad the Impaler. I was. But the man who played the iconic villain was very down-to-earth and arguably had an even darker life.
Norbert Grupe was born in Berlin in 1940. He was the son of Richard Group, who worked as a baker, then as a boxer, and as a police officer in the Buchenwald concentration camp.
What is the Story of Norbert Grupe?
As a boy, Norbert Grupe worked as a butcher, docker, butcher, docker and waiter. He also worked as a wrestler with his father. The two often wore Viking costumes and wrestled as a tag team called “The Vikings”.
After noticing that his last name was a bit like the English word for “groupie”, Norbert decided to move from his group to Wilhelm von Homburg by paying $5 for his new boxing license.
Von Homburg continued boxing independently until 1962 and soon established himself as boxing champion. According to a contemporary report in Der Spiegel magazine, Wilhelm was once ranked his seventh best boxer in the world.
Wilhelm retired from boxing in 1970 at the age of 30. At the time, he was living in St. Pauli (Hamburg’s red-light district) and hanging out with a rough clique made up mostly of Hells’ Angels and pimps. Ultimately, von Homburg’s dangerous lifestyle landed him in prison after being caught dealing drugs with an undercover cop.
After being released from prison, von Homburg pursued an acting career. In 1977, he got his first role after German director Werner Herzog cast him as a pimp in Strosek.
Von Homberg solidified himself as a pop culture icon after appearing in Ghostbusters II. Von Homburg was 50 years old when he played the film’s main antagonist, the Carpathian Vigo. He spent most of the film as an inanimate painting, only taking action towards the end of the film when the painting came to life.
Ultimately, Carpathian Vigo’s lines were dubbed by Max von Sydow, taking into account Homburg’s heavy and obscure accent.
Despite his role in Ghostbusters II, von Homburg’s film career was unsuccessful. His last major role was his Charles Macum Diggs in 1992’s Diggstown. After that, he fell into oblivion.
Walter Staudinger, one of von Homburg’s oldest friends, said in the same interview that the former actor and boxer “didn’t like it when someone liked him”. He spent his last years homeless, surfing his couch and sleeping at the YMCA.
Von Homburg eventually developed prostate cancer, which metastasized to his pelvis, spine and brain. Realizing that he was dying, he went to Staudinger’s house in Mexico.
von Homburg died on March 10, 2004. Von Homburg was a bitter man to the end, but Rona’s refusal to tell von Homburg of her father’s death at first led to Staudinger telling her sister to give her a month of his death.
What Movies Does Norbert Grupe Starred In?
After spending several years in prison, von Homburg seriously tried to pursue an acting career. German director Werner Herzog, who saw him boxing in his youth, cast him as a bullying pimp in the 1977 film Strosek.
A decade later, von Homburg was cast as James, one of Hans Gruber’s henchmen, in the 1988 action thriller Die Hard, while Bruce Willis’ character exploded with plastic explosives in an elevator shaft.
Von Homburg’s biggest role came at age 50 when he was cast as the main villain in the 1989 comedy sequel Ghostbusters II, where his soul was freed from a medieval painting. He played Vigo the Carpathian, a dictatorial sorceress.
The character’s full name was Vigo von Homburg Deutschendorf, which was a tribute to the name he chose as his performer. The film was released less than a year after the death of von Homburg’s father, Richard, despite the fact that neither his father nor his sister had reconciled.
His last major role was as Charles McCam Diggs, a former boxer in the Diggstown plant that was a commercial flop.
