As a nine-year-old boy, he grew into the face of our province through his role in the TV series Bartje: Jan Krol. 2023 is the year of the death of the boy from Drouwen with the most famous blonde quiff in the Netherlands.
“Jan is Bartje Bartels for you, but for us he is and remains a brother and we have now lost him,” Hans Jalving and Ina Dekker look back on Krol’s death. They played Bartje’s brother (Arie) and sister (Lammechien) in the TV series.
“Jan was just Jan,” Bartje’s stuttering brother reminisces. “Just act normal, you’re already acting crazy enough.” Krol was the cornstarch of the Bartje family. “He was very social, always thought of others. A real people person,” says Dekker. “It is always unpalatable when someone dies early.”
When the documentary was filmed in May last year, there was nothing wrong with Krol. “There was a vital guy there,” Jalving reflects. “One lump of positivity,” said Dekker. In December, Krol suddenly suffers from balance problems. He bumps into everything and the left side of his body does not function properly. Research shows that ‘Bartje’ has a brain tumor and Krol dies as a result of this on January 15.
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