David Michael Hasselhoff is an American actor, producer, singer, and businessman that is well-revered in Hollywood. His talents, legacy, and personality have endeared him to fans worldwide. Hasselhoff was born on July 17, 1952, in Baltimore, Maryland, to Dolores Theresa, a homemaker, and Joseph Vincent Hasselhoff, a businessman. Hasselhoff is a Cancer and of German, Irish and English descent. He has childhood memories of Jacksonville, Florida, and Atlanta, Georgia. As a child, Hasselhoff made his theatrical debut in “Peter Pan,” an experience that ignited his passion for Broadway. Hasselhoff attended Lyons Township High School in Illinois and then enrolled at the California Institute of the Arts, where he graduated with a theater degree.
After graduation, Hasselhoff got his feature film debut in “Revenge of the Cheerleaders” (1974).
He got his breakout role on “The Young and the Restless,” where he played Dr. Snapper Foster from 1975 to 1982. Hasselhoff appeared in more movies before debuting his singing career on the children’s program “Kids Incorporated,” with the song ‘Do You Love Me.’ From 1982 to 1986, the actor starred as Michael Knight in “Knight Rider.” He made his return to television in 1989 with “Baywatch”, where he starred and executive produced for 11 years. The show’s 2001 finale was watched by a billion viewers. “Baywatch’s” success made Hasselhoff incredibly wealthy, with a net worth of $100 million at the time.
Hasselhoff went on to star in several more productions. He reprised his role as Knight in “Knight Rider 2000” (1991). He also received a Hollywood Walk of Fame star in 1996, starred in “The SpongeBob Squarepants Movie” (2004), and became an “America’s Got Talent” judge in 2006. Hasselhoff has done everything from “Dancing with the Stars” to hosting “W.W.E Raw,” reprising his role as Snapper in 2010, to starting a reality series. He’s had a sitcom series, made short films, and dabbled in motivational speaking. The actor also has 14 studio albums, with the last released in September 2019. Hasselhoff is a man that just won’t quit. He’s a highly successful actor, producer, T.V. personality, singer, and businessman who shares his success with his wife, Hayley Roberts, and two children. This is Hasselhoff’s third marriage.
Why We Love David Hasselhoff
He impacted German pop culture
In 1989, Hasselhoff had a Number One hit in the German pop charts with a record titled 'Looking for Freedom,' and was notable for playing it near the Berlin Wall on New Year's Eve 1989, just days after it fell. The Berlin Wall performance left an indelible mark on German pop culture, with Hasselhoff remarking that the song became an ‘anthem’ and ‘song of hope’ for the people of East Germany.
He played Micheal Knight
You already know that Hasselhoff played Knight in “Knight Rider” from 1982 to 1986. His performance in “Knight Rider” earned him the title of ‘Most Popular Actor’ in the People's Choice Awards, and more than 33 years later, the show is still broadcast all over the globe.
He believed in the potential of “Baywatch”
“Baywatch” was canceled in 1989 after just one season, but Hasselhoff saw potential in the show and decided to bring it back while serving as executive producer. “Baywatch's” second version ran for a total of 11 years until the show's series finale in 2001, establishing Hasselhoff as one of the top television actors of the time. Hasselhoff's net worth is over $100 million as a result of this achievement, royalties, and other business activities.
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Actually, the hero worship began not in Germany but neighboring Austria.
By Christian Blauvelt
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The love affair between David Hasselhoff and the Germanic people has, for three decades now, been one of the great riddles of global pop culture.
Why, of all American entertainers, does the 64-year-old Baywatch and Knight Rider star so entrance the citizens of Deutschland? And not so much as an actor but as a singer? There’s even a joke about it in the new Guardians of the Galaxy movie: Chris Pratt’s character remembers how as a child he used to fantasize that his father was David Hasselhoff, but he never saw him because he was always — cue rimshot — touring in Germany.
“One time I was in a sauna in Sweden,” Hasselhoff tells The Hollywood Reporter. “Two guys were in there with me. ‘We’re Germans! I’m from East Berlin and he’s from West Berlin. You are a legend in our country. We had nothing, and this man, an American who drove a talking car and sang about freedom, became our hero.”
Actually, the hero worship began not in Germany but neighboring Austria, where, in 1985, Hasselhoff’s debut album, Night Rocker, unexpectedly shot to No. 1 on the local charts. “I said, ‘That’s impossible,’” Hasselhoff recalls. “It sold seven copies here in America, and I bought five and my mom bought the other two.”
The German invasion didn’t happen till three years later, around the time the Berlin Wall fell, when the country’s first privately owned TV network, RTL, began broadcasting American programs, including Knight Rider, Hasselhoff’s action series about a detective who drives a talking car. Even though Hasselhoff is of German descent — there’s a village named Hasselhof outside Frankfurt — it wasn’t his ethnic connection that resonated. “I think Germans rather like the American-ness about him,” says Hanna Pilarczyk, a culture writer for Der Spiegel. “Also, his music is very simple and it’s something to clap along to. Germans like to clap along to very straightforward rhythms.”
Hasselhoff, for his part, was smart about exploiting his German popularity. Seizing the end of the cold war as a creative opportunity, he reconfigured a hit German song from the 1970s, “On the Road to the South,” as “Looking for Freedom,” which became the No. 1 single on the West German charts for eight weeks. When Hasselhoff sang the song on The Sylvester Show — the German equivalent of Dick Clark’s New Years Rockin’ Eve — at the Brandenburg Gate on New Year’s Eve 1989, it was a touchstone moment for the whole nation. Crowd size was estimated at 1 million.
“I think you can compare the situation back in 1989 to a huge party where everyone was drunk,” says Pilarczyk. “And you start making out with that guy who was attractive and available but then you forgot about it. But years after the party, people still keep reminding you, ‘Remember that night you made out with David Hasselhoff?’ What can we say? It happened.”
It’s still happening, with the make-out session continuing for nearly 30 years. Hasselhoff has released 10 albums in Germany and has had nine top 30 songs in Austria. He’s appeared on the German version of Celebrity Big Brother and interviewed East Berliners who tried to cross into the West during the Cold War for a National Geographic documentary (Hasselhoff vs. the Berlin Wall).
To this day, he’s still appearing in concert on German soil, often with acts like Iron Maiden and Green Day, and Germans still clearly adore the American with the talking car who sang about freedom. “At one concert recently, there were 100,000 people,” Hasselhoff says. “After the previous act ended at 1:30 in the morning, I thought maybe 70,000 would leave. But everyone stayed for my set and chanted, ‘Hoff! Hoff! Hoff!’”
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