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Actress Johanna von Koczian
Photo: Horst Ossinger / picture alliance / dpa
The actress Johanna von Koczian is dead. She fell asleep peacefully in Berlin surrounded by her family on Tuesday at the age of 90, her former agent told the German Press Agency on Thursday, citing the family. Johanna von Koczian became famous in the 1970s with the song “The Little Household,” one of the biggest hits of that time.
She appeared with it in the “Hit Parade” and Dieter Thomas Heck swept the show steps. But her career, which spanned more than 60 years, was much more than just one song about the household and “a little bit of ironing.” The actress was considered “the German Audrey Hepburn” and had already appeared on stage under Gustaf Gründgens.
Their spectrum ranged from Kleist, Shakespeare and Lessing to “Praxis Bülowbogen” and “In aller Friendship”. She wrote books and presented television shows (“Do You Recognize the Melody?”). At the age of 77, she achieved success in 2010 at Berlin's Kudamm Theater, where the trained soprano played the "worst opera singer in the world" in the comedy "Glorious!" The audience laughed in tears.
Koczian's film career began in 1957 with the comedy “Viktor and Viktoria”. She made her breakthrough in Kurt Hoffmann's “We Wunderkinder” (1958) alongside Hansjörg Felmy. Her stations included the Residenztheater in Munich and the Theater in der Josefstadt in Vienna. The mother of one daughter was married to the music producer Wolfgang Kabitzky, who died in 2004, for almost 40 years.
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