Mr. Meyer-Burckhardt, how did you come to the “NDR talk show” in 1994?
Whether I’m a television producer, talk show host or book author – I find nothing as interesting as people. Every person is a cosmos. every person has a fear, every person has a hope, every person has. an injury that will affect him for the rest of his life. In this respect, I can’t imagine anything more exciting than humans. Approaching through a film, a conversation, a book is the most exciting thing I can imagine. At that time I did two formats on ARD that were critically successful. The NDR had seen this program and asked me if I would like to do the talk show. Since I’m talking to ROLLING STONE: I compare my fate a bit with Charlie Watts, who, when asked how he got into the Rolling Stones, said: Well, they made me an offer for six months, I had the money well needed – that turned into 50 years.
You have previously been a film and television producer, a journalist, worked in the theater, at an advertising agency, you write books, do “Time Travel” on NDR and “Women’s Stories” on the radio. How do you juggle all of this work?
It’s the lack of talent for taking a vacation – or the inability to be idle. I’m happy to be able to do all of this. When asked what I like to do most, I say: Everything! I consider it a great privilege to be able to do all of this in the fall of my career. I’ve had a lot all my life and – three exclamation points!!! – ENJOYED working, not always and not everything, but most of the time. I don’t like the term “work-life balance” because it implies that there is only life when there is no work. I was never private, but I was never really on duty either.
Are the “time journeys” with Baedeker on television the only trips you take?
I’m constantly on the go. I recently went to Iceland with my wife, which I can also recommend for music, and to Riga in Latvia, where there is an exciting music scene. We will be in California in January. But. I’m not one to lie on the beach for long. I am a traveler, but not a tourist.
From 1994 to 2001 you moderated the “NDR talk show”, then you were away for a while and came back in 2008 with Barbara Schöneberger. What was the reason for your return?
I don’t like the term “host” – I host a talk show. I prefer the American word “host”. “Moderate” sounds like a warm shower, taking the focus off. However. During my time on the board of Springer and Pro7, I realized that I was not a corporate man, but rather a manufactory man. That means I’m a good producer, a good managing director of a production company, a pretty good author and, in my opinion, a pretty decent host of a talk show. There are people who can do it better and there are also better boards. So after doing that for six years, I was homesick for being a producer. So when the contract was fulfilled, I went back.
And also back to the talk show.
That’s how it turned out. I went to the Polyphon group in Hamburg, and Thomas Schreiber, now head of Degeto, asked me if I wanted to do the “NDR talk show” again. I said it depends on the partner on the show. I was sitting at the airport in Brussels and Thomas said: “That’s Barbara Schöneberger.” Note: she wasn’t such a big star back then. I knew her from three encounters and thought: That’s great!
One remembers Alida Gundlach’s conversation with the deranged Klaus Kinski, which is shown again and again. Has there been similar turmoil on any of your shows?
Barbara did her masterpiece when she spoke to Marcel Reich-Ranicki, who was obsessed with men (on television) and wanted to talk to me. But then we paired him with Barbara. After the broadcast he said: “That was a really great conversation.” Barbara therefore had the blessing of Marcel Reich-Ranicki very early and very rightly. God bless him, this wonderful man. What I remember most are early conversations with Lotti Huber and Hildegard Knef. I have done more than 500 shows. Sometimes it’s not the stars who are most interesting, but rather people who do something social, like get people out of loneliness.
Did you get to know the veterans Dagobert Lindlau, Hermann Schreiber and Wolf Schneider, who hosted the first “NDR talk show” in 1979?
Not Dagobert Lindlau. But he said the nice sentence with regard to the presenter: The viewer in Germany sits on the sofa and asks: “Is he allowed to do that?” Wolf Schneider was later a guest on the talk show because he wrote a book about the “Titanic”. had. And Hermann Schreiber was once on the show because he had written a book about Gruner & Jahr that was worth reading. I only knew them as guests.
Did you have a role model at the beginning?
I thought Johnny Carson and David Letterman were great. They had the advantage that the American mentality requires that every guest knows that they are part of the show and that they bring themselves with them. In other countries, guests don’t want to be unbuttoned. And in Germany many people say: “I actually don’t like going on talk shows.”
It is often said: “We don’t have the stars in Germany.” Is that true in your experience?
There is a phenomenon that culminates in the word “Schadenfreude”. It is inherent in this that we have something equalizing. The sentence “He only cooks with water” is always said with relief instead of regret. There was once a program on German television called “Unfortunately Good”. The history of stars in Germany is one of decline. Marlene Dietrich was a “screen goddess”. Goddess! Later there was Uschi Glas, Boris Becker, Michael Schumacher: the star as a friend. Bobbele, Schumi: Reductions. Finally, the jungle camp: the viewer is put in a position of strength and must bring the fallen angel, the star, out of misery. Due to the inflation of the term, it has lost its meaning.
How did you come across “Women’s Stories” – there are now 120 radio shows?
A few years ago I spoke to the director of NDR and said that I would like to do a radio show because I had never worked in this medium before. I had the idea of portraying women. Why women? I was raised by women. And I have that feeling. that women feel less self-pity. Women define themselves more by the person, men by the function. And I have observed that women become anarchic as they age and men become pregnant with meaning. These are the reasons why I started the series ten years ago. A Rod Stewart song is always played at the end.
Such a coincidence: The last question concerns Rod Stewart. Which album is his best?
I would name two albums. You notice, it comes like a shot from a gun! The third album, Every Picture Tells A Story, has enormous power and energy. And the record he made after he went to America in 1975, Atlantic Crossing, produced by Tom Dowd. The selection of songs is very good. Although I’m a lifelong Rod Stewart fan, I have to say: The remaining Rolling Stones are aging better. Rod Stewart is on his way to becoming America’s answer to Ricky Shayne.