This was it then. After 8.5 years, presenter Arjo Kraak will stop his talk show KRAAK. The last broadcast will be recorded on Sunday and after that Arjo will have to spend his Sundays differently from now on. “That’s a crazy idea. It’s completely in my body to get up on Sunday morning and come here to make those broadcasts. It takes some getting used to,” he says.
Nearly a thousand guests have joined Arjo Kraak in the 350 broadcasts of the talk show that he has made. From famous to less famous people. They all came with a beautiful, special or fun story to discuss with the presenter.
Arjo started the program about 8.5 years ago. “And then you just go on and on. In the first few years we kept thinking: can we have another season?” he says while standing in the studio. “And so the years add up. The editors also noticed that at a certain point they no longer had to explain what they were calling for. It has become a small institution in Brabant.”
“It’s more fun to start something, but above all I’m satisfied.”
Arjo considers it an enormous privilege that he has been able to make this talk show for so long. The fact that it stops now takes some getting used to, not only for him but also for the audience. “We receive a lot of responses from viewers, including people from outside the province. There is even a man from Cologne who said that he is German, but that his mother is from Brabant. Through my program he learned what is going on in Brabant. “
It is strange for Arjo to stop the show after all these years, but he looks back on it with a good feeling. “It is more fun to start something than to finish it, but above all I am satisfied. We have been able to create something beautiful and I think it is good that there is something new. Melancholy is of course also part of it.”
When Arjo thinks back to all those guests who came by, a few moments stand out. “Judoka Roy Meyer came to sit here at the table. We had his trainer, an elderly man who is no longer alive, say some last words in a video to Roy. Then you see that very large, muscular athlete completely break with a kind of Máxima tear on his cheek.”
The last CRACK on Sunday.
The last broadcast of KRAAK. can be seen on Sundays from 12:00 to 14:00 on Omroep Brabant TV and Brabant+. It is an extra long broadcast in which several guests sit at Arjo’s table.
The visit of Sanneke Langendoen from Uden also made a deep impression on Arjo. Years ago, her mother was murdered by her father. “She came out with a book in which she tells her story and in which she explains how she was able to rekindle a relationship with her father,” says Arjo. “Fantastic story. She could tell it beautifully. Yes, that will stay with you.”
“It’s the fastest minutes of the week for me.”
Sometimes there was some tension at the table. “For example, when priest Rob Mutsaerts came by. He had written a book about the woke-culture. That same Sunday, Rikkie Kollé also joined because she had won the beauty pageant. She was born as a boy, but later became a girl,” says Arjo. “Then you have someone at the table who actually says that the other should not exist. That bothered me quite a bit.”
The last episode of the talk show will be recorded this Sunday. “Time always flies by. It’s the fastest minutes of the week for me.” Although it will be different on Sunday. “Don’t expect a tear from me, but you never know,” laughs Arjo.