Entertainer
An entertainer is a performing artist who appears before an audience and is associated with a particular stage presence. Secondarily, however, the term is also used simply as a synonym for any performing artist.
Artists described as entertainers are usually active in several areas of the entertainment industry at the same time, for example in roughly equal proportions as authors, musicians, actors, presenters and comedians. However, there is often a clear weighting or focus on one or two of these sub-areas. Late-night talker Harald Schmidt, for example, spent most of his career as a television presenter, but also worked as a writer, actor, cabaret artist and columnist. John Barrowman studied performing arts and focuses on acting, but also works as a comedian, (musical) singer, solo entertainer, television and radio host, and youth and comic book writer. In addition to his acting career, Neil Patrick Harris also entertains as a musical singer and television presenter, as well as an acrobat and magician (including in the Academy of Magical Arts).
Mainly musical entertainers who were popular in the 20th century included Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Liberace, Sammy Davis, Jr, Dean Martin, Judy Garland, Rosemary Clooney and Udo Jürgens. Today, Robbie Williams and Madonna, among others, are considered entertainers.
In the German-speaking world, besides Udo Jürgens, Harald Juhnke, Peter Alexander, Rudi Carrell and Peter Frankenfeld were also very well-known entertainers. They are also associated with the big Saturday night shows like Musik ist Trumpf, the Peter Alexander Show and Wie wär's heut mit Revue? Nowadays Michael Schanze and Roberto Blanco can be counted among them. In the GDR, for example, Helga Hahnemann and Horst Köbbert served this division.
Entertainers are also hosts of talk shows, currently in Germany, for example, Thomas Gottschalk, Stefan Raab or Götz Alsmann, the latter also being a classical musical entertainer. Sometimes solo entertainers are also called entertainers.
The Guinness Book of World Records calls Michael Jackson the "most successful entertainer of all time", as his album Thriller is the best-selling album in the world to date and all of his subsequent albums have also reached the top of the international charts.
But also magicians, jugglers and other artists close to the artistry are called entertainers. These artists are mostly booked for shows as loosening up program points or they play themselves a full-length program and act so as a center and entertainer.
