Peter van der Vorst holds his breath when channel star Gerard Joling joins Today Inside. That combination is of course a ticking time bomb. What requirements does he impose on such a visit?
Years and years ago, Gerard Joling was very fanatical about writing all kinds of political columns on his own website. He looked a bit like Geert Wilders’ pink brother; Muslims and mosques were hit with it every week. “My mother will soon have to cycle to find a church and Islam can walk to the mosque in every city!”
Rabid right
It resulted in a very sharp sneer from Özcan Akyol at the time and yesterday the two sat together in the VI studio. Like an accomplished stoker, Wilfred Genee confronted his studio guest Gerard with Özcan’s earlier statements, but unfortunately that did not lead to fireworks. Gerard managed to keep his composure quite well.
In any case: according to Angela Groothuizen it is evident that Gerard is a rabid right-winger. RTL 4 saw a nice program in this years ago; he sent Gerard on a trip to all kinds of foreign countries to get to know other cultures. But then the Black Lives Matter movement exploded and RTL’s TV boss Peter van der Vorst no longer dared to do it.
Trip to VI
It is evident: Peter, one himself SP voter, has PVV voter Gerard under contract, but is doing everything he can to suppress that right-wing side of his. And that is also good for Gerard himself, because the penguin riot around Erica Meiland has proven that even as an A-star you can quickly skim along the abyss.
Gerard’s manager would rather not have him join the like-minded men of Today Inside. If they give a populist right-wing cross, Gerard is inclined to head it in. And that is dangerous. Extremely dangerous. What requirements does Peter impose on such a performance at Today Inside?
Two demands
Peter makes two demands. The most important thing is that Gerard is not allowed to simply join VI, for example to express his right-wing opinion. He must have musical work to promote. “He can sing or not? Because otherwise he won’t come. He only has one demand: if I am not allowed to sing, then I will not come,” said Johan Derksen in yesterday’s episode.
So Gerard takes a musical leaf of his mouth: “Well, that’s a bit sensitive, let me put it that way. You understand that, right? I am under contract with RTL, so I am very happy that I can do my number here. That is simply a sensitive matter.”
17 songs
Wilfred Genee jokes: “You always have to have a reason to sit here, namely that you can sing a song. You have 17 songs on this CD, so you can come 16 more times after this.”
Gerard laughing: “I will definitely do that!”
Wilfred: “You have an excuse every time!”
Gerard: “Yes, with production approval of course!”
Silence ban
The second demand is that Gerard does not talk about his canceled program Joling and the Foreigners. He has a gag order on that subject. “RTL actually doesn’t allow me to talk about it anymore, so I won’t. I was going to make six, I made five and for special reasons it was never broadcast.”
It’s a shame, Gerard still thinks. “In my opinion it was one of the most beautiful television programs I had ever made. (…) But maybe they were right, that they thought it was too dangerous.”
For the time being we mainly see Gerard singing in VI. The political notes remain, very safely, untouched…