He was seen as the oldest working actor in the world in 2016.

Beginning in the 1950s, he was successful especially on German television.

Between 1967 and 1977 he achieved great popularity in his most famous role in the German detective series Graf Yoster, where he played the main part of the same name.

Ammann lent his voice in German dubbing Peter Sellers (in John and Julie, 1955) and Lucky Luke (in the animated film Daisy Town, 1971).

Lukas Amann's mother was a singer and his father a painter.

In 1966, Ammann played in the first color-TV series Adrian der Tulpendieb.

He continued to work steadily for over 70 years.

After he saw Schiller's The Robbers at grammar school in Basel, he aspired to be an actor.

After World War II, Ammann belonged to the Ensemble of the theatre Kleine Freiheit in Munich. Guest performances and tours led him to stages in Austria, Scandinavia and the USA.

In the beginning he worked in St. Gallen and later at the Schauspielhaus Zürich with Therese Giehse.

Starting in 1933 he attended the acting school of Max Reinhardt in Berlin. In 1934, he left Germany with Heinrich Gretler for Switzerland. Because of his Jewish mother, he was discriminated against even in Switzerland.

In 2013, he worked again, aged 101, with the director Ronnie Vogt on the movie Reunion Solitaire.

In 1998, he played a purported survivor of the Holocaust in Dani Levy's film Meschugge.

In 2005, at age 92, he played Abi Golstein in Micha Lewinsky's Swiss short film Herr Goldstein. It won an award for best Swiss short film at the Locarno International Film Festival.

In 1948 he participated under Kurt Hirschfeld in the role of the attorney in the premiere of Herr Puntila und sein Knecht Matti.