In the late twenties Berlin gave the world a singing sextet whose popularity, in today's terms, would rival that of the Beatles. Now all but forgotten, the Comedian Harmonists were the rage until politics busted them up in 1935, when the group's three Jewish members were forced to emigrate and the other three musicians made the decision to remain in Germany. Like so many riches from the cultural renaissance of Weimar Berlin, the legacy of the Comedian Harmonists died with their music. Eberhard Fechner has unearthed their story in the fourth and last film in his "Panorama of German History in This Century," documentaries in which recent German history is revealed in the lives of those who lived it. It is not a series that focuses on the rich and famous, but if the sounds of the much-loved singing troupe were entirely unique, in a way their lives after 1935 were not: their story becomes that of the German people-those who were to live their lives in exile, and those who for reasons both complex and banal, remained in Germany. Of the three Jews who emigrated, only one (a prominent cantor in San Francisco and Los Angeles synagogues) achieved anything remotely resembling the course of fame and artistic achievement the Comedian Harmonists seemed destined to follow. But the three who stayed made their own bargain with destiny: trying to accommodate to the regime brought on their downfall as musicians and as menschen, as their attempts to preserve the group with new members ended in mutual accusations before the Gestapo, who in any case banned their music after 1941. Fechner, in typical fashion, revives the era through the eyes of the artists themselves (with the wives of the two deceased members providing memories equally rich in detail). "The Comedian Harmonists has to be experienced to be believed," wrote Ronald Holloway in a 1977 Variety review. "It pulls no punches and is highly critical without imposing a private thesis upon the proceedings."