Frank-Burkhard Habel was born at around the same time as the 1953 East German uprising: he grew up in the Prenzlauer Berg district of East Berlin. While still at school he gained stage experience as a child actor. While still young received stage training from a number of members of the East German stage and film establishment, including Benno Besson, and Rudolf Ulrich. Without pausing - at this point - to obtain university-level qualifications, in 1971 he joined the theatre company of Berlin's "Theater im 12. Stock", and sustained his association with this theatre (subsequently rebranded as the ) till 2005. After he started to work in television he very quickly became something of a part-timer at the theatre, however.