BERLIN – The agent for Dutch-born entertainer Johannes Heesters says the artist died on Christmas Eve. He was 108.
Heesters made his name performing in Adolf Hitler’s Germany and was dogged later in his decades-long career by controversy over his Nazi-era past.
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Agent Juergen Ross said Heesters died at the hospital in the southern city of Starnberg early Saturday.
Heesters’ career took off in Berlin, where – starting in 1935, two years after the Nazis took power – he became a crowd favourite at the Komische Oper and Admiralspalast.
Heesters was never accused of being a propagandist or anything other than an artist willing to perform for the Nazis, and the Allies allowed him to continue his career after the war, when he took Austrian citizenship.
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