We find ourselves in the face of the pyramids, and four friends are chasing their next case. Tarzan, Gaby, Karl and Klößchen sit on dromedaries and ride towards their next mission. Then the caravan comes to a standstill. Gaby reads something – and looks amazed. “Sorry, that was your text!” she says and hands Tarzan a piece of paper. All four laugh. Dumpling’s camel collapses. “These are Bactrian camels, not dromedaries!” are his last words before he rolls off the animal’s back.
Desert adventure with humor
Fortunately, the dromedaries that Klößchen thinks are Bactrian animals are not real, but made of fabric, oversized cuddly toys. And the four friends, better known as TKKG, the first letters of their first names, are looking for an Egyptian artifact. But “The Lost Scepter of Giza” is a play based on the radio play of the same name, with which the TKKG speakers are on tour and which will be performed this evening at the Berlin University of the Arts. Little mishaps like mixed up notes and stuffed animals falling make every evening different and lively; This is also how the audience sees it, who laughs louder than almost anywhere else.
The TKKG roles are taken on by the speakers from the original cast, Sascha Draeger as Tim, Tobias Diakow as Karl, Manou Lubowski as Klößchen and Rhea Harder-Vennewald as Gaby. The ensemble is complemented by Nic Romm as narrator, other speakers and the foley artist Peter Sandmann, who creates his effects live at the edge of the stage. Cultural criticism is also dealt with in TKKG: “Here in Egypt they built the wonders of the world, ours just went into the forest and set up stones in a circle.”
Successful series with history
The “Gizeh” trip in front of full houses proves how popular the radio play gang still is, whose adventures have been produced since 1981 for the European label and under the direction of Heikedine Körting. After “The Three ???”, also a European product and launched two years earlier, TKKG is the most successful radio play series about young detectives: 42 gold records, 14 million books sold and 33 million radio play cassettes and CDs sold. To date there are 247 episodes. From the “F-word”, the “question marks” of the “three ???” The series, written by Rolf Kalmuczak under the pseudonym Stefan Wolf, has long since emancipated itself, although the radio play performances do not yet take place on huge open-air stages.
Before the performance, ROLLING STONE met the speakers for an interview. They are like many adult dubbing or radio play actors who embody teenagers: young at heart, lively in a likeable sense and, in keeping with their roles, with a sense of in-jokes that only they understand.
The team behind TKKG
They have known each other for a long time: Manou “Klößchen” Lubowski has been there since the first episode, as has Sascha “Tarzan” Draeger; Tobias Diakow, the youngest, has spoken Karl since episode 195, Rhea Harder-Vennewald Gaby since episode 167. Of course, all of them also work as actors or voice actors for other radio plays, films or series.
“We won’t see each other for a few months,” says Harder-Vennewald, “then we’ll meet in Heikedine Körting’s villa in Hamburg. We’ll go into the attic in the studio and fool around like children again.”
Humor, friendship and audience
Many jokes are at the expense of the overweight Willi “Klößchen” Sauerlich. A reality check in the audience at the University of the Arts shows that this is accepted. Nobody thinks about body shaming, even though younger generations in particular are considered sensitive to body issues. And in the audience there are not only fathers from Generation A transgenerational phenomenon in times of streaming, skips, distraction and diverse radio play offerings.
This is how TKKG went on tour in 2025:
“Dumplings are the most offensive,” says Manou Lubowski. “But we live in the year 2026. By now it should be recognized that everyone can live the way they want.” Nobody has the right to judge another person for their body. “Klößchen really doesn’t have to ask herself questions like that anymore: ‘Why do you have to be so fat, do you always have to eat chocolate…’ No, I do what I want to do!” For Lubowski, Klößchen is a role model. “I love him immensely. He calms down, solves conflicts with humor and lets everything roll off of him.”
Cohesion and joy of playing
“We never diss him,” says Karl spokesman Tobias Diakow. “We say: What you’re doing isn’t particularly healthy – but we love you. One for all, all for one.”
“Exactly,” adds Rhea “Gaby” Harder-Vennewald. “We are the Four Musketeers.” You can hear this in the episodes, in the spontaneity, in the funny in-between conversations, in the many dialogues that, like all European radio plays, are recorded together, which for production reasons is perhaps not always easier than separate recordings that are then edited – but it sounds more authentic.
Live on stage
You can tell how well-rehearsed TKKG are from the live performances. Unlike in the studio, the four are not facing each other, but in a row, facing the audience. “No problem,” says Sascha Draeger, who has voiced Peter Timotheus “Tarzan/Tim” Carsten since episode one. “We would immediately notice if one of us is having difficulties. No matter if a lamp doesn’t work, a microphone dies or I make a mistake with the pieces of paper – it’s all completely safe.”
The question of routine can arise in a series that is decades old, but not of boredom. “We are in ninth grade and have solved more than 240 cases within one school year,” says Diakow. “I think something like this is relatively rare.” Draeger adds: “There is no other city with millions of people that has this much crime.”
Looking into the future
So how will TKKG solve their cases in the future, and do they see artificial intelligence as a danger, keyword replacement by artificial voices?
“We cannot be replaced,” says Rhea Harder-Vennewald. “Our listeners have known us for many, many years.” “And people now don’t just know our voices,” adds Diakow. “That’s the good thing about social media, we can present our faces there. Would AI be a real threat to us? No, because if we were replaced by a program, that program wouldn’t have any real fans to celebrate it. Nobody develops a spiritual connection with AI.”
Analogous to acceleration
In any case, Sascha Draeger, Tobias Diakow, Manou Lubowski and Rhea Harder-Vennewald want to continue as a team for a long time. “We are the antithesis to fast social media,” says Draeger. “We are analog and slow you down. Parents tell us that they play TKKG episodes for their children.” Then the children’s eyes begin to light up: “And the children get on board too.”
