Kessler twins Ellen and Alice, singer-dancers who performed with Sinatra and Belafonte, dead at 89
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They performed together with Frank Sinatra.With Harry Belafonte.
With Fred Astaire.And on Monday, Germany’s Kessler twins — Alice and Ellen — ended their lives together at age 89.
Police confirmed the death to the Associated Press, stating in an email that it was a “joint suicide.” The women shared a house in the suburb of Grünwald, just south of Munich, Entertainment & Arts Actor Sally Kirkland has died at 84.The Golden Globe winner and Oscar nominee for the 1987 movie ‘Anna’ had gone into hospice care over the weekend.The sisters, who were born in the town of Nechau on Aug.
20, 1936, “no longer wanted to live” and “had chosen to end their lives together,” the German outlet Bild reported Monday, according to an automated translation.Medically assisted dying is allowed in Germany under certain conditions, the outlet said, for people who are legally capable and acting of their own free will.
The women were inseparable in life as well as death, learning to dance when they were children and applying their skills with the Leipzig Opera children’s ballet, the AP said.In 1952, after World War II ended and the family found itself living in the newly created German Democratic Republic, East Germany, they all fled to West Germany.
The tall twosome — reportedly 5-foot-10 — was discovered three years later while dancing in Düsseldorf in 1955, by the director of Paris’ Lido cabaret, according to German news agency DPA International.That launched an international career for the Kesslers, who moved to Rome, toured the world and performed with luminaries, DPA said.
They refused an offer to appear in “Viva Las Vegas” with Elvis Presley, the AP said, not wanting to get pigeon-holed in American musical films.But according to IMDb, they had a decent career in film and TV, which included mostly Italian and German projects.
They sang on “The Ed Sulliva...