Mourning for film legend Hardy Krüger.
Hardy Krüger is dead. The actor and writer died in California on Wednesday at the age of 93, as his agency announced on Thursday in Hamburg.
He died suddenly and unexpectedly in Palm Springs. “His warmth of heart, his joie de vivre and his unshakable sense of justice will make him unforgettable,” it said.
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Krüger (middle) in the film “Hatari!” (1962) alongside US icon John Wayne (†1979)Photo: SEEGER
Tanzania, 1970: Krüger with his second wife Francesca, daughter Malaika (left) and son Hardy jrPhoto: Horst Ossinger/dpa
The native of Berlin, who lived in California and Hamburg for a long time, played the leading role in around 75 films. After the war he was one of the few German actors to have an international career.
Krüger made his breakthrough outside of Germany in the British war film One Came Through. He starred opposite John Wayne in Hatari!, along with James Stewart and Peter Finch in Flight of the Phoenix.
1965: Hardy Krüger (right) with Richard Attenborough (left) and James Stewart in the film “The Flight of the Phoenix”Photo: ddp images/pwe
In 1963, the French drama film “Sundays with Sybill” received an Oscar – Krüger played a Vietnam veteran who blames himself for the death of a Vietnamese child. The actor himself has received various awards over the course of his career, including the Federal Film Prize and the Grand Cross of Merit.
Krüger was in front of the camera with stars like Claudia Cardinale, Sean Connery, Yul Brynner, Charles Aznavour, Cathérine Deneuve and Orson Welles. On television, he created a classic as a “globetrotter” in the ARD series of the same name. With his book “A Farm in Africa” Krüger also started a career as a writer.
As successful as his film career was, Hardy Krüger’s family life was just as turbulent: After separating from Francesca, contact with his actor son Hardy Krüger jr. largely, as he said in an interview with BILD am SONNTAG in the summer of 2019: “After my parents separated, he initially tried. I was often in America with my sister. But at the latest when I started my own family and therefore had other questions, it became less. So I focused on my own life. We haven’t been in touch for three years now. It’s broken off. That is of course unfortunate.”
Hardy Krüger and his son Hardy Jr., who also became an actorPhoto: imago images / Kai Horstmann
When asked if he feared not seeing his father before his death, Krüger jr. back then: “Of course, that’s always present. The thought that he dies and that we haven’t seen each other before, hurts me a lot too. I always let him know what’s happening with me. But it’s his decision whether to act on it. I don’t want to blame myself for that either.”