For three years, Tijs van den Brink sat in front of the viewer on the right at the table at Op1, but everything has recently changed. He is now suddenly on the left and that takes some getting used to. But why is that anyway?
For years and years we have seen Tijs van den Brink sitting on the right side of the table in Op1. But when his co-host Giovanca Ostiana was replaced by Margje Fikse last month, everything changed. Tijs has been banished to the other side of the table and Margje is now very triumphant in his old place on the right-hand paper.
No coincidence
What is going on here? “This is of course not a coincidence,” explains TV connoisseur Victor Vlam in the podcast The Communicados. “It’s not like those people just happen to sit down somewhere and that’s it. No, this kind of thing is thought about in the television world. So the question I had was: why did Tijs van den Brink change places?”
Colleague Lars Duursma: “Yes, it is not a musical chairs: whoever arrives first can choose where to sit.”
Victor: “No, certainly not. And all those duos at Op1 are also in a different way. So it’s not necessarily male on the left, female on the right or things like that. Each duo just chooses a little bit how they want to sit. That is different for everyone, but it is consistent.”
‘This is the reason’
How is this exactly? Victor: “I just contacted Margje Fikse and I asked her: why is this, why is Tijs suddenly on the left? She answered that. It was actually someone behind the scenes who asked, ‘Yeah, how do you actually sit? You could look again at how you sit down.’”
“And then Margje – it was her initiative – said: ‘Well, you know Tijs, it’s very good for people to switch things up now and then. Then your earpiece is also on the other side, you have to sit differently. Then you train your brain.’ That was her argument to convince Tijs to indeed sit on the left. And that is ultimately what happened.”
Logically
Victor fully supports Margje’s seat choice. “I can also imagine that you would like that. If you form a new duo, you also want it to feel a bit new to him, because otherwise you will have the feeling that you are getting on a moving train and everything is new to you, but to the other people it is it’s not new.”
He continues: “Now it is also a little bit awkward for him again and then he has to find his way. So I can actually imagine that that is sensible.”
Second reason
However, there is something else involved, Victor knows. “Margje also indicated that her second reason is that she does not have to take Giovanca’s place. You don’t want to sit in her chair, literally. You feel a bit like a substitute.”
He concludes: “It is also a mental process. She has filled in for Giovanca in the past and you want to have the feeling that you really belong there now. That it’s your place. So then I can also imagine that you don’t want to literally sit on Giovanca’s chair.”