Jan Hendriks

Jan Hendriks (6 December 1928 – 13 December 1991) was a German film actor.^[1] He appeared in more than 80 films on screen and TV between 1950 and 1985. In 1952 he won the German Film Award as Best Male Newcomer. Between 1977–1985 he co-starred in the TV-crime-serial The Old Fox.

In 1959, he also made headlines when he was charged under Section 175 of the German Criminal Code, which was still in force at the time. He was fined. After a serious motorbike accident in 1963, he was in a coma for several months but suffered no lasting damage.

In the 1960s, he appeared in several Edgar Wallace films. Hendriks also worked as a dubbing artist in the 1960s, lending his voice to Humphrey Bogart (The Petrified Forest), Anthony Quinn (Guadalcanal – Hell in the Pacific), Robert Stack (To Be or Not to Be) and Robert Stephens (Cleopatra). His film work came to an end in the late 1960s. From the 1950s onwards, he also worked in television and appeared in several series. From 1977 to 1986, he played Detective Martin Brenner alongside Siegfried Lowitz in the television series Der Alte. He was also occasionally engaged in theatre tours, where he appeared in his last role in 1988.

Hendriks was found dead by the police in his Berlin flat on 17 December 1991 after they had been notified by neighbours. He had died alone there a few days after his 63rd birthday and was not discovered until days later. The press reported that the cause of death was the immune deficiency disease AIDS. He had also suffered from diabetes for many years