Louis Hofmann

Louis Hofmann (born 3 June 1997) is a German actor. He first gained attention as the lead in the 2011 German film and won the Bodil Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role as a teenage German prisoner of war in the 2015 Danish film Land of Mine. Internationally, he is known for playing Jonas Kahnwald in the 2017 German Netflix series Dark (2017–2020).

Life and career Hofmann was born in the Bensberg district of Bergisch Gladbach and grew up in Cologne. His first experience in front of the camera was for Servicezeit, an evening magazine programme on WDR Fernsehen television network. He appeared in a section of the programme, Die Ausflieger, which tested family recreational activities. After two and a half years at Servicezeit, he decided to become an actor and applied to an acting agency. He was subsequently represented by Agentur Schwarz.

His role as Wolfgang in the 2015 film Sanctuary (German: Freistatt) directed by Marc Brummund earned him the 2015 Bavarian Film Prize as Best Newcomer Actor and the 2016 German Actors Award (Deutscher Schauspielerpreis) in the newcomer category. His first international role as a German prisoner of war in the Danish-German co-production Land of Mine (Danish: Under sandet) earned him the Best Supporting Actor prize at Denmark's Bodil Awards in 2016. At the 2016 German Film Awards, he received with the Special Prize Jaeger-LeCoultre Homage to German Cinema presented to honour the work of German actors in international films.

In 2016, Hofmann played Phil in Center of My World (German: Die Mitte der Welt), a coming-of-age romantic drama film directed by Jakob M. Erwa, based on the 1998 bestselling novel The Center of the World by Andreas Steinhöfel. He was presented with a European Shooting Stars Award at Berlinale 2017 by the European Film Promotion organisation. A third and final season was released on 27 June 2020.

In 2022, Hofmann was cast as Werner Pfennig in the Netflix series adaptation All The Light We Cannot See, based on the 2014 novel. The series is set during World War II and was released on 2 November 2023. In March 2023, Hofmann joined the cast of Apple TV+ production Monstrous Beauty. He also appeared in Apple TV+ series Masters of the Air, produced by Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg, which was released on 26 January 2024.

Selected filmography

Film

Television

Radio Year Title NotesRef. 2006–2009 Die Ausflieger

Awards and nominations