BEIRUT: Sixty years after her death in a mysterious car crash, a television series about Arab singing diva and spy Asmahan is captivating audiences with details of her short but racy life.

Born a princess to Syrian Druze nobles, Asmahan, whose real name was Amal al-Atrash, challenged her family and shocked her conservative Arab and Muslim community by breaking a string of taboos.

The woman known as the “golden voice” drank, smoked, had numerous love affairs and even an abortion, and she also filed for divorce from her husband Hassan so she could devote herself to singing.

Her links with the British intelligence services during World War II when she spied on Nazi Germany and Vichy France, and her work with the Free French forces, added further intrigue to a life which ended when she was just 26.

Now she has come back to delight aficionados and woo a new generation of fans thanks to the controversial series “Asmahan” being broadcast during Ramazan.

Night after night Arab television audiences are introduced to more and more intimate details about the life of the melancholic singer with a unique fluid, crystal voice.

The series reveals she also had an affair with Ahmed Hassanein Pasha, the multi-talented tutor and head of Egyptian King Farouk’s royal household.

Asmahan’s untimely death in 1944 in a mysterious and never resolved traffic accident triggered wild rumours. Some suggested she was the victim of her spying, while others even claimed her Egyptian rival Om Kalthoum was involved.

“This is a courageous series. It touches upon a taboo subject concerning Asmahan’s life,” said Nejib Ayed, the Tunisian producer who deliberately chose to broadcast the series during Ramazan, when television ratings soar.

Student Rabab al-Mansuri, 18, said she likes “the revelations about the tumultuous life of the adored diva... This is unprecedented for Arab television.”—AFP