In 1945, Giese made his debut on stage in his native Neuruppin, then in the
Soviet occupation zone. Later he appeared on television. His first role in a movie was at the 1954 production
Alarm in the Circus (
Alarm in Zirkus). He performed in around 50 films and television productions, and is known for his portrayals of
Joseph Goebbels in several films, including in the five-part series
Liberation, film
Soldiers of Freedom, the two-part Bulgarian production
Anvil or Hammer and in the Czechoslovak comedy ''
Tomorrow I'll Wake Up and Scald Myself with Tea''. Giese had a long correspondence with actor
Klaus Kinski, who once visited him in East Berlin during 1956. Shortly before the building of the
Berlin Wall, Giese bought a West-German television device, and was arrested by the
Stasi. To avoid punishment, he became an informant of the service. He was later accused of aiding the Stasi to arrest a man who helped residents of Berlin to flee to the west; the man was subsequently imprisoned for 26 months. In 1972, after an accident forced him to a long vacation, he started to write the radio drama
The Extremely Peculiar Jazz Adventures of Mr. Lehmann (
Die sehr merkwürdigen Jazzabenteuer des Herrn Lehmann), in which he voiced 28 different characters. He recorded and edited the entire series in his
Babelsberg home, finally completing it in 1979. Due to technical difficulties, the
Jazz Adventures was only broadcast in 1991, after the fall of the Wall. Giese received a prize from Germany's War Blind Union. He later produce three other radio dramas:
The Extremely Peculiar Film Adventures of Mr. Lehmann,
The Case of Leonardo and
If Goebbels Would Have Gone to Japan. ==Filmography==