Born to Joseph Florath, a locksmith, and his wife Matilda, née Burkart, he attended school in Brakel and the Realgymnasium in Paderborn.
When the First World War began, Florath interrupted his artistic career, volunteering as a reserve lieutenant and serving as an instructor of recruits.
[1] After the failure of the Bavarian Soviet Republic and the murder of Kurt Eisner, Florath went to Berlin, where he served from 1920 until 1944 in the ensemble of the National Theatre and also directed.
He played in literary adaptations such as Alfred Döblin's Berlin Alexanderplatz, Gerhart Hauptmann's The Beaver Coat and Henrik Ibsen's Nora, in dramas such as Friedrich Schiller – The Triumph of a Genius (along with Horst Caspar), in comedies such as Die Feuerzangenbowle, but also in Nazi propaganda films such as Ich klage an (1941), Junge Adler (Young Eagles, 1944) and even in Jud Süß.
[2][3] After the war, he returned to challenging roles, including Love '47 (based on Wolfgang Borchert's drama Draußen vor der Tür (The Man Outside) and next to Curt Goetz in Doctor Praetorius (1950) and The House in Montevideo (1951).