Anne Frank: The Whole Story
Promotional television miniseries poster
Genre	Biographicalwardrama
Based on	Anne Frank: The Biography byMelissa Müller
Screenplay by	Kirk Ellis
Directed by	Robert Dornhelm
Starring	Ben Kingsley Brenda Blethyn Lili Taylor Hannah Taylor-Gordon Tatjana Blacher Joachim Król Jessica Manley Nicholas Audsley Jan Niklas
Theme music composer	Graeme Revell
Country of origin	United Kingdom Czech Republic United States
Original languages	English German French Spanish Italian Dutch Hebrew
No. of episodes	2
Production
Executive producers	Tomas Krejci Hans Proppe
Producer	David R. Kappes
Production location	Prague, Czech Republic
Cinematography	Elemér Ragályi
Editor	Christopher Rouse
Running time	190 minutes
Production companies	Milk & Honey Pictures Dorothy Pictures Touchstone Television
Original release
Network	ABC
Release	May 20 (2001-05-20) – May 21, 2001 (2001-05-21)

Anne Frank: The Whole Story is a 2001 two-partbiographicalwardrama television miniseries based on the 1998 bookAnne Frank: The Biography byMelissa Müller. The television miniseries aired onABC on May 20 and 21, 2001. It aired in the United Kingdom in late 2001 onChannel Four. The television miniseries starredBen Kingsley,Brenda Blethyn,Hannah Taylor-Gordon andLili Taylor. Controversially, but in keeping with the claim made by Melissa Müller, the television miniseries asserts that the anonymous betrayer of the Frank family was the office cleaner, when in fact the betrayer's identity has not been definitively established. A disagreement between the producers of the television miniseries and theAnne Frank Foundation about the validity of this and other details led to the withdrawal of their endorsement of the dramatization, which prevented the use of any quotations from the writings ofAnne Frank appearing within the television miniseries. Both Kingsley and Taylor-Gordon receivedGolden Globe andEmmy Award nominations for their performances asOtto Frank and Anne Frank, respectively.

In 1939, Anne Frank (Hannah Taylor-Gordon) realizes her world is beginning to change around her. Eventually, theNazis invade theNetherlands. Anne becomes increasingly distressed as her rights are taken away, and her family is ominously being forced to register as Jews with the government and to wearyellow stars. She is then forced to leave her school and attend a Jewishlyceum, where she meets her new best friend,Jacqueline van Maarsen (Victoria Anne Brown), who is only half-Jewish. Anne also meetsHello Silberberg (Nicky Cantor), on whom she develops a crush; it is implied that Hello also reciprocates her feelings. On her 13th birthday, she receives the famous checkered-patterned diary and immediately goes to her room to write her first entry.

A few weeks later, on a normal Sunday in July 1942,Margot (Jessica Manley), Anne's sister, receives a call-up from theGermans to be deported to a "labor camp" in theEast.Otto Frank (Ben Kingsley) moves his family into the now-renowned "Secret Annex", followed soon by Hermann and Augustevan Pels (Joachim Krol andBrenda Blethyn), their son Peter (Nicholas Audsley), andFritz Pfeffer (Jan Niklas), the Frank family'sdentist. During their stay in the annex, the Van Pels family members are noted for their constant bickering. Fritz becomes Anne's antagonist, and Anne has her first serious relationship with Peter, from whom she receives her first kiss. All the while, she wishes for an end to the war. Anne also gets her first period while in the annex - an occasion that she had been anxiously awaiting. One night a thief breaks into the building below the annex, leaving the eight refugees in terror.

Eventually, on August 4, 1944, the Franks are denounced byLena Hartog (Veronica Nowag-Jones), the cleaning lady of thebusiness in which the annex resides. The eight people in the hiding are arrested and Anne's diary is dumped onto the floor while SS manKarl Silberbauer (Holger Daemgen) searches for hoarded money. Two of the helpers (of those in the Secret Annex) are also arrested. In conversation with Otto, Silberbauer is stunned to learn that he served as an officer in theImperial German Army duringWorld War I. Silberbauer laments that, if they had not gone into hiding, Otto and his family would have received decent treatment.

Afterwards, the Franks are sent on a train toWesterbork, a transit camp, where Anne, her family and friends are held in the criminal "S Barracks". There, Anne meets a woman,Janny Brandes-Brilleslijper (Klára Issová) and her sister Lientje (Zdeňka Volencová), who are later seen with Anne inBergen-Belsen. Anne also befriends the camp's schoolteacher (Jaroslava Siktancova), who often invites Anne to the camp school to tell the students stories. (One of them is Mrs. Quackenbush, a story that Anne had written before going into hiding, and had been assigned to write by her math teacher as punishment for repeatedly talking in class)

Anne and her family are soon transported toAuschwitz, where the women are stripped of their clothing and their hair is shorn. She is separated from her father and the other men. During a selection for women in the camp to go to a safer place to work in a munitions factory, Anne's mother and sister are chosen, but Anne is not. Therefore,Edith and Margot choose to remain behind. Anne and Margot are sent to ascabies barracks and later deported toBergen-Belsen, which is no more than many large tents on a muddy ground surrounded by an electric fence. Mrs. Van Pels eventually arrives at the camp to find Anne very thin and Margot sick withtyphus. One night Anne sees her old friend, Hannah (Jade Williams), through the fence. Hannah is a privileged prisoner and tells Anne that her father is dying but her sister is alive. She throws a package with bread and socks over to Anne.

In the last scene with Anne, a fevered Margot and Anne speak of the days before they went to Bergen-Belsen. They go to sleep. The next morning, Anne opens her eyes, and hears birds outside. She nudges Margot to show her, but Margot doesn't wake up, and instead falls out of bed onto the ground. Anne realizes that Margot is dead, and lifts her eyes to the sky in defeat.

After the war in 1945, it is revealed that Otto is, in fact, alive. He looks for information about his daughters, but has no luck in doing so until he is directed to find Janny Brandes, who survived the camp. Otto is told that Anne died a few days after Margot.Miep Gies (Lili Taylor), who helped the Franks hide, gives Anne's preserved diary to Otto. Otto reads it all. He then goes up to the now empty annex and photos. He collapses in a crying heap in front of Anne's wall, which is still plastered with movie stars. An epilogue is then shown which describes what happened to everyone mentioned in the story.

Anne Frank: The Whole Story earned critical acclaim from critics and viewers. TheNew York Post called the television miniseries "undeniably powerful".

Anne Frank: The Whole Story was released on VHS and DVD on August 28, 2001, byBuena Vista Home Entertainment. The only difference between the DVD and VHS version of this television miniseries is the trailer ofSouth Pacific on the DVD.

• List of Holocaust films
• List of films about Anne Frank
• List of television films produced for American Broadcasting Company

• Anne Frank: The Whole Story atIMDb

• 2001 American television series debuts
• 2001 American television series endings
• American biographical series
• Films about Anne Frank
• American Broadcasting Company television dramas
• 2000s American television miniseries
• Biographical films about writers
• Films based on biographies
• Films directed by Robert Dornhelm
• Films set in the 1930s
• Films set in the 1940s
• Peabody Award–winning television programs
• Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Miniseries winners
• Primetime Emmy Award–winning television series
• Biographical films about children
• Holocaust films
• Films scored by Graeme Revell
• Films shot in the Czech Republic
• Czech television films
• Czech war films
• Television series about the Holocaust
• American World War II films
• Czech World War II films
• British World War II films
• Czech films based on actual events

• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Use mdy dates from March 2025