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Two families, one German, one Danish, in Friedemann Fromm's ZDF mini-series “Tod von Freunde” on Ochseninsel in the Flensburg Fjord supposedly live the dream of a friendship across borders.
Then part of the hippieesque community goes out to sea.
And one of the kids goes overboard.
Fromm's eight-parter observes what happens, how secrets, little lies, the repressed past make a paradise explode.
Jan Josef Liefers plays along with Katharina Schüttler and the Danish series star Jakob Cedergren.
Fromm's miniseries works like a mosaic, each episode tells the story of guilt, responsibility and friendship centered around a main character, until the truth comes to light in the end.
“Death of Friends” is - visually and narrative - exciting television.
The best of both worlds.
Families, one German, one Danish, in Friedemann Fromm's ZDF mini-series “Tod von Freunde” on Ochseninsel in the Flensburg Fjord supposedly live the dream of a cross-border friendship.
Then part of the hippieesque community goes out to sea.
And one of the kids goes overboard.
Fromm's eight-part series observes what happens, how secrets, little lies, the repressed past make a paradise explode.
Jan Josef Liefers plays along with Katharina Schüttler and the Danish series star Jakob Cedergren.
Fromm's miniseries works like a mosaic, each episode tells the story of guilt, responsibility and friendship centered around a main character, until the truth comes to light in the end.
“Death of Friends” is - visually and narrative - exciting television.
The best of both worlds.
WORLD:
You probably think back to the "death of friends" with a little sadness.
The series was made before Corona.
In the meantime, however, you have continued to work.
How did that go
Friedemann Fromm:
I had imagined it would be worse.
Except for wearing the FFP2 masks, the impairments were manageable.
However, partly because financiers are a bit cautious at the moment, I put a large German-British project on hold and instead shot two episodes of “Helen Dorn” as a smaller, lean, flexible project.
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WORLD:
“Helen Dorn”, the ZDF series with Anna Loos, is also quite a physical format.
Does the thought of corona measures have an impact on writing?
Fromm:
In so far as less extras are used, of course.
The more people there are on set, the more complicated everything gets.
And before we shot physical scenes, everyone involved - although we were constantly being tested anyway - were tested again.
And if someone still felt uncomfortable in this situation, we would have dealt with it.
But we didn't have to.
We didn't have a corona case on set.
The strategy of the production company Network Movie has paid off.
WORLD:
Strangely enough, masks do not even appear in films that were made under Corona conditions.
A bit of nostalgia then blows through the living room, as if you had switched to a country without a mask or distance.
One is almost touched.
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Fromm:
We also discussed for a long time, then decided with ZDF that we would keep Corona out of the films.
Putting masks on the characters is not enough.
Corona, the Corona measures, that has to be part of the story.
And then you have to clarify what you're saying and where it's going.
It's not an easy question.
A sworn community: The residents of Ochseninsel with Bernd (Jan Josef Liefers, left) and Sabine (Katharina Schüttler M.) in the center
Source: ZDF and Letterbox / Thorsten Jan
WORLD:
When will the first Corona films be released?
Fromm:
They're being shot.
I've also been asked for a love story under corona conditions.
But that fell asleep again.
On the other hand, Corona is a historical event that you may still need a little distance to really assess and evaluate it.
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WORLD:
Let's switch back to shooting without a gap.
What was the trigger for “death of friends”?
Fromm:
A very private fear.
I spend a lot of time on the water, also with my sons and their friends.
At some point the thought struck me like lightning what actually happens when something happens.
What does such a loss, such a responsibility do with oneself, relationships, friendships?
The idea then bothered me so much that I wrote a text about it.
WORLD:
What was there of this complex labyrinth that ended up being the "death of friends"?
Fromm:
The two families, the German-Danish setting, including the ox islands, where everything happens.
But because the story became so complex, I wanted to have a dramaturgical accompaniment with me, preferably a writer from Denmark.
So Mette Sø came on board.
WORLD:
Which was also part of the wonderful series “The Inheritance”.
And co-wrote the Dan Sommerdahl episodes for ZDF.
Fromm:
Through them we got tutoring in Danish thinking.
And then together with her I did a kind of family constellation.
Until everything we knew about the characters was on nine large flipcharts in our writers room.
And then we walked around it until I realized what kind of dramaturgy these characters need.
Bernd Küster (Jan Josef Liefers) and Sabine Küster (Katahrina Schüttler) at night at the harbor
Source: ZDF and Letterbox / Thorsten Jan
WORLD:
What is the difference between German and Danish storytelling?
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Fromm:
The Danes dig much deeper into their characters.
Even in thrillers, which tend to be plot-driven, a lot of attention is paid to the characters.
There is also a great deal of freedom to think the characters in their contradictions.
I always found that very liberating in the discussions.
In addition, the Danes are much more interested in consensus at work.
Conflicts are discussed until everyone agrees.
This is sometimes very time-consuming.
Basta decisions, as you get them presented in Germany from time to time by the production or the respective broadcaster, are rather frowned upon in Denmark.
WORLD:
You once said that you have to take the audience by the hand.
This is especially necessary in “Death of Friends”.
The narrative structure is quite advanced for a German Sunday evening.
Fromm:
It wasn't planned that way from the start.
But when the figures were on the flipcharts, at some point I thought: This is so personal what happens to Bernd and Sabine, Jakob and Charlie and the young people that we should try to get closer to each figure through one episode instead of one of the usual ones squeeze nested structures.
And then there was the thriller element, which was also important to ZDF and us.
Which meant that we had to keep the tension, every episode had to contain thriller elements, the story had to continue.
That was the real challenge, to continue the story in a surprising way in eight personal perspectives.
The friends Cecile Jensen (Milena Tscharntke l.), Kjell Küster (Lukas Zumbrock M.) and Emile Jensen (Oskar Belton)
Source: ZDF and Letterbox / Thorsten Jan
WORLD:
How - for heaven's sake - was that actually shot.
Fromm:
Tom Sielski, my assistant director, asked himself that after reading the books.
That is nested, shifting all the time.
In the end, we put the individual episodes together on a timeline and made a very long film of 450 minutes.
Every scene got its place on this timeline, so that every department knew where we were in this story, in this episode, in this scene and how that corresponds to the scene from the other episode.
If we hadn't done it like that, everyone would have gone mad.
Tom did a killer job.
WORLD:
Do you actually believe in the possibility of a paradise as the friends on the Ox Islands in the Flensburg Fjord think they live.
The fact that the ship on which the accident happened is called Orplid, like Eduard Mörike's Fantasy Land, is no accident - you come from Mörikeland.
Fromm:
No, of course the Mörike quote is no coincidence.
I believe that every form of paradise is limited in time.
Interestingly enough, there was actually a commune in the houses on the Ochen Islands that tried to live their form of paradise.
These people also broke up at some point, failed because of themselves and their problems.
It is impossible to maintain a paradisiacal status quo over the long term.
There is always a dynamic moment, a development, also a destructive element like Jakob Cedergren's Jonas in “Death of Friends”.
Either a paradise develops with it and overcomes the destructive element, or at some point it will no longer be.
WORLD:
Was nationalism, which also plays a role in the plot, were the shadows of German-Danish history, the differences between the two countries, also an issue during the shooting?
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Fromm:
Of course.
In the border region, however, people tend to define themselves as residents of this fjord area, not as Germans or Danes.
The German-Danish friendship is generally regarded as a blueprint for a reconciliation between two countries.
That was also a reason for me to ask what happens when such a relationship comes under pressure.
When it might break up again.
What actually happened in the refugee issue between Germany and Denmark also happened in the families in “Death of Friends”.
This idea that we are all the same is of course a delusion anyway.
There are of course differences.
For example, the Danes have a freedom gene in their DNA, the idea that we are all free people.
As a result, for example, you can make racist statements public in Denmark because freedom of speech is a very important asset for the Danes.
They are convinced that extreme opinions give rise to dissenting voices that correct everything again.
Another example of this freedom gene: none of the Danish actors had a contract, at least at the beginning of the shooting.
They didn't care.
But that also meant that if they hadn't liked it, they would have been gone again.
Nobody in Germany would dare to do that.
For the production it was a nightmare until the very end.
They were always afraid.
It would have been a catastrophe if Jakob Cedergren had suddenly stopped showing up for the shoot.
WORLD:
Do I hear a bit of envy?
Fromm:
(Laughs) I thought that was great.
On the other hand, of course, free and without a contract, I would lack security.
And because I have this idea of security - I want to feed my family - I noticed again that I am German.
WORLD:
Another topic that runs through history is saying goodbye, grief.
How do you actually deal with grief?
In search of the truth like Bernd, would you drill the figure of Jan Josef Liefers until everything breaks apart?
Fromm:
That was one of the questions I asked myself while writing.
I think I'm like Bernd and would really want to know what really happened.
When discussing grief work with psychologists, they always emphasize the fact that you have to end with death.
Therefore, in the event of accidents, no expense or effort is spared to rescue corpses.
Because it is incredibly important to bury the person in order to be able to say goodbye.
If you don't have that moment, the wound will continue to grow.
When it became known recently that the brother of the missing Tengelmann heir did not want to have the brother declared dead, I could understand that on the one hand.
On the other hand, the grief never stops.
I would probably commute between the two extremes and would be unlikely to be grateful if someone would take me by the hand and guide me.
Solving such a situation on your own is brutal.
WORLD:
In “Tod von Freunde” - unlike in “Weissensee” - politics appears only as one of many slides.
Are you fed up with politics on television after the failure of your series “Die Stadt und die Macht”, which was previously celebrated by many as a kind of Berlin local politics version of “House of Cards”?
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Fromm:
When “Die Stadt und die Macht” was on Netflix, I got a lot of positive feedback and I often wondered what went wrong there.
Positioning it as a “House of Cards” variation was certainly a problem.
And then the whole creation and development process was always accompanied by the question of why we are doing this at all.
Politics on German television, it was said again and again, that it doesn't work.
In the end - a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy - it actually didn't work.
But instead of going over to see what didn't work and why that was the case and what you can learn from it, you buried the project straight away.
The error culture in Germany, I sometimes wish it was different.
WORLD:
I still have a wound.
How's "Weissensee" doing?
Another season is coming, is there the movie that Regina Ziegler once fantasized about?
Fromm:
The idea for the fifth season has been around for a long time.
I had already written that into the fourth.
I wanted to go back to the beginnings of the characters.
In the zero hour of the GDR.
Actually everyone thought it was great at first.
Then, when the fourth season was out and our arch villain was dead, it dawned on those responsible that none of the original actors would be there in "Weissensee - Episode Null".
This step was felt to be too daring.
Then a tentative attempt was made to continue telling the story towards the present.
But that was not followed up either.
I let go of "Weissensee" first.
If you ask Regina Ziegler about the movie now, she will probably say that nothing is over yet.
Regina never gives up.
WORLD:
You once said that putting series on public television was like drilling thick boards.
Have the boards got thinner due to competition from streaming competition?
Fromm:
The openness and the willingness to take risks have increased in recent years.
A project like “Tod von Freunde” with this complex dramaturgy would not have gone through a few years ago.
Here I experienced ZDF as very fearless.
I am currently seeing a great desire for new things in public law.
The fact that they now want to produce directly for the media library shows that and how they want to reposition themselves.
Conversely, a lot is running on streaming services that would previously have run on Sat1 or would have been produced on RTL.
At least in Germany, the differences are leveling out.
WORLD:
As a born Swabian, how did you get on the water?
Fromm:
My father was a sailor.
And I learned to sail on the Max-Eyth-See in Stuttgart.
This is an extremely treacherous area, I often fell into the water.
During my time in Munich it lay fallow, because I was a mountain person.
Since I've been here in Hamburg, I've actually been on the water all the time.
I love that.