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Max Hansen — Actor, Singer, Writer, Producer
The illegitimate son of the Danish actress Eva Haller and the Swedish Captain von Waldheim, Max Haller was born in Mannheim on the 22nd of December, 1897. Making his first appearances at the Munich Cabaret Simplizissimus in 1914, he went on to Vienna, where he completed his studies as a ballad singer. Thinking that it may perhaps be advantageous to draw attention to his Scandinavian origins, he changed his name to Hansen.
Profiting from his powerful, highly modulating voice, he became known as the "little Caruso" in cabarets and variety theaters, performing comical couplets, sketches and opera parodies. In 1923, Hubert Marischka engaged him for the role of Csupan in the play "Gräfin Mariza" at the Theater an der Wien, which after 900 performances went on to be staged at the Metropol-Theater in Berlin, where Hansen became quickly successful.
From 1925, Hansen recorded his own hits, which audiences appreciated for their parody and cabaret-like wit. Together with Paul Morgan and Kurt Robitschek, he established the Cabaret of Comedians. His greatest stage success was his performance of Leopold in Ralph Benatzky's musical "Im weißen Rößl" ("The White Horse Inn") in 1930, a role he had already played in 1926 in Richard Oswald's film version of the comedy by Blumenthal and Kadelburg.
After doing some short sound films, Hansen established together with Paul Morgan and Carl Jöken the Trio-Film GmbH. Hansen's sly young looking face, his graceful timing as well as his slightly nasal voice which invariably stamps the mind made him the ideal comedian for sound movies. With Erich Engel's comedy "Wer nimmt die Liebe ernst?", he reached an initial artistic highpoint.
With the premiere of "Das häßliche Mädchen" on the 8th of September,1933, which had been postponed for a long time simply because the authors Hermann Kosterlitz and Felix Joachimson happened to be Jewish, there occured a pre-arranged Nazi incident. Hansen was called names and thrown with tomatoes. Not because of his supposed and scarcely proven Jewish origen, which may at first seemed to have been the reason, but rather because of Hansen's 1932 hit song "Warst Du schon mal in mich verliebt?", mocking Adolf Hitler for being homosexual. Hansen immediately left for Vienna, where he had a highly successful stage career. He then left for Copenhagen before the "Anschluss" in 1938, which annexed Austria to Nazi Germany.
In 1951, Hansen returned at first to Germany, performing a number of roles at various Berlin theaters, including again the role of Leopold in "Im weißen Rößl". In 1953, he returned to Denmark, where he performed further stage roles. He lived with his second wife Britta and their three children in Copenhagen, where he died on the 14th of November, 1961.