Hennes Bender

Hennes Bender (born 19 February 1968 in Bochum as Hans-Günther Bender) is a German comedian, voice actor and actor. Bender's family came from Rüsselsheim, where both parents were employed at Opel, and with the opening of the Opel works in Bochum the family moved to the Ruhrgebiet. Hennes Bender grew up in Bochum. In 1990 he played Hamlet in a one-off performance of his youth club at the Schauspielhaus Bochum. From 1992 to 1997 he performed together with Heinz-Peter Lengkeit as the comedy duo Lengkeit gegen Bender, and in 1997 he completed his studies in film studies at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum.

From 1998 Bender presented the Sunday radio comedy show Toast on the youth station of the Hessischer Rundfunk, hr XXL, and for his cult radio comedy Scheiße - die Hafenpolizei! he received the Kurt-Magnus-Preis of the ARD in 1999. He gave his television debut in 2000 in the reality soap Geld für dein Leben. He appeared several times as a comedian on the shows Zimmer frei!, NightWash and the Quatsch Comedy Club, and in 2004 received the Deutscher Comedypreis in the category Bester Newcomer. He tours nationwide with his comedy solo programmes, including Egal gibt's nicht (premiered 13 October 2007 in Bielefeld), Erregt (2010), Klein/Laut (2013) and Luft nach Oben (2016).

Bender is also active as a voice actor: in the 2006 animated film Cedric he voiced the scientist Dr. Quuh, and he has worked on numerous audio play productions. Since 2013 he has presented the podcast Sträter Bender Streberg together with Gerry Streberg and the Kabarettist Torsten Sträter, and on 28 December 2024 he announced his departure from the podcast after 11 years. He is married and lives in Bochum.