Twins Alice and Ellen Kessler have died, the Dpa news agency reported. Both were 89 years old and died in Gruenwald, near Munich, in the house where they lived next to each other, in two neighboring apartments, separated only by a sliding wall. Police intervened and did not provide further details.
Bild newspaper reported that Bavarian criminal police had opened an investigation to clarify the cause of death, while Der Spiegel reported a law enforcement operation was underway in Gruenwald, near Munich.
Icons of the stage, famous in Italy as singers, dancers, actresses and soloists, Alice and Ellen are also known as the “legs of the nation”, a nickname that was born in 1959 and has persisted over time. They were born on August 20, 1936 in Nerchau, Saxony, not far from Leipzig. Here they begin to take part in Opera ballet from childhood. In 1952, at the age of sixteen, they left the German Democratic Republic and settled in West Germany, in Duesseldorf, where their career began which saw them perform all over the world with artists such as Frank Sinatra and Fred Astaire.
After arriving at the age of 19 among the ranks of the legendary Blubell Girls, they moved from the lights of the Paris Lido to the Rai television studios in Winter gardenbetween Don Lurio and the Cetra Quartet, and later Studio One with Mina. It was 1961 and the great television director, Antonello Falqui, established the basic grammar rules of Saturday night variety shows. Since then we have all, at least once, hummed it Da-da-un-paperhaps imitating a Teutonic accent and some hip-shoulder movements.
According to the Bild newspaper, they had written in the will that, after cremation, the ashes would be placed in the same urn. Inseparable in life and, as they have expressed, also in death. The two sisters wanted to be buried together, in one urn, next to the ashes of their mother Elsa and their dog Yello. “That’s what we set out in our will,” Ellen said in an interview with Bild in April 2024, deciding to commit suicide with assistance.
