The unlikely 1960s sitcom “Hogan’s Heroes” featured a feisty war prisoner played by French-born Robert Clary, a victim of Nazi camps during World War II. Robert Clary passed away on November 16 at his Beverly Hills, California, home. He was 96. Brenda Hancock, his niece, announced the demise but did not disclose the cause.
His Career
Before making an appearance in “Hogan’s Heroes,” Mr. Clary started his professional life in Paris as a club singer. He later performed in musicals on stage and had comparatively tiny film roles. During its 1965–1971 run, the CBS comedy, which featured Allied troops in a POW camp outwitting their goofy German army prisoners with spy plans, played the war solely for laughs. As Cpl. Louis LeBeau, the 5-foot-1 Mr. Clary wore a beret and a sarcastic grin.
Robert Clary
Bob Crane, Larry Hovis, Richard Dawson, and Ivan Dixon played the prisoners in the sitcom, which also starred Mr. Clary as its final surviving original star. European Jews who fled Nazi persecution before the war included Werner Klemperer and John Banner, who played their captors. Until 1980, Mr. Clary said he kept quiet about his personal wartime experiences until others who downplayed or rejected the work accomplished by Nazi Germany to eliminate Jews compelled him to come up. His parents and ten siblings were among the twelve members of his close family who perished under the Nazis, according to Mr. Clary’s biography, which was published on his website.
Robert Clary, A5714: A Memoir of Liberation,” a documentary about Mr. Clary’s youth and years of misery at the hands of the Nazis, was published in 1985. Identification numbers were tattooed on the forearms of captives held in concentration camps; Mr. Clary’s permanent mark was A5714. He was one of several Holocaust survivors included in the book “The Triumphant Spirit” by photojournalist Nick Del Calzo, which was published in 1997. The youngest of 14 kids, Mr. Clary was birthed as Robert Max Widerman in Paris on March 1, 1926. He was 16 years old when the Nazis abducted the majority of his family.
His Childhood
He described a joyful childhood that ended when he & his family were ejected from their Paris house and loaded into a crammed cattle car that took them to prison camps in the documentary. He was freed from the Buchenwald prison camp by American forces after spending 31 months in imprisonment in several concentration camps. Returning to Paris, he was met with his 2 older sisters who formerly escaped the concentration camps. He then worked as a vocalist and released music that was well-liked in the United States.
He began his career in the United States in 1949 with club appearances and recording before moving on to Broadway musicals like “New Faces of 1952” and eventually to movies. He made cameos in movies like “The Hindenburg,” “A New Kind of Love,” and “The Thief of Damascus” (1952, 1963). (1975). Additionally, he appeared in soap operas like “The Bold and the Beautiful,” “Days of Our Lives,” and “The Young and the Restless.” In 1965, Mr. Clary wed Natalie Cantor, the actress-singer Eddie Cantor’s daughter. 1997 saw her passing. He claimed that despite the sadness of his family’s horrific wartime experience, he didn’t feel uncomfortable about the humor of “Hogan’s Heroes.”
FAQs
1. What is the age of Robert Clary?
Ans. 96 years
2. Who is the wife of Robert Clary?
Ans. Natalie Cantor
3. When is Robert Clary’s birthday?
Ans. March 1, 1926
4. When did Robert Clary die?
Ans. 16 November 2022
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