German Narratives in International Television Format Adaptations: Comparing Du und Ich (ZDF 2002) with Un Gars, Une Fille (Quebec 1997-2002)

Abstract

This article cross-culturally compares the German remake of the Quebec sketch comedy/sitcom series Un Gars, Une Fille ("A Guy and a Girl") the the original version by correlating quantitative data derived from the Adobe Premiere Pro annotation function on the duration of narrative segments and incorporating these data into a an interpretation of family conflict management strategies, gender roles and conflicts between the mother-in-law and the the young 30something couple as protagonists. The article examines a scene in which the daughter confronts her mother's trauma-inducing behavior on her as a young girl, and the boyfriend confronts the mother-in-law's animosity toward him. The article delves into the background for the transactional, belligerent, and obligational thinking behind the family relationship of the German couple compared to the more affectionate and conciliatory relationship in all other versions. The investigation postulates that the family relationships in the German context must be seen within the context of the Inability to Mourn, a major psychological study by Margarete and Alexander Mitscherlich in the 1960s of politically salient post World War 2 trauma among a large variety of social groups in West (and East) Germany. The emotional repression as a result of various forms of guilt, which never explicitly surfaced in the confrontations, was passed down from generation to generation, while this same, or similar social psychological contexts was seemingly not a factor in other countries, many of which had also experienced repressive dictatorships during World War 2 and afterwards, in which adaptations of these series were produced. Further collaborative investigations would be required to uncover the reasons for this discrepancy. The proliferation of global television formats since the 1950s, particularly those of scripted fictional narratives and their local adaptations, raise important questions about the nature and content of global culture and discourses, and the local contributions to those discourses. Each iteration is the result of cultural, historical, political, technical, and economic conditions specific to each country, and help determine how culturally, aesthetically, and discursively proxemic local narratives are created. German producers have long participated in the global format trade, both officially and “inofficially.” The German adaptation of the US crime series Dragnet in the 1950s, known as Stahlnetz, became paradigmatic for a long tradition of German crime shows currently still popular, such as the West German Tatort (ARD from 1971), and the East German Polizeiruf 110, and the plethora of similar shows currently on both public service broadcasters ARD and ZDF, as well as their private broadcasting counterparts. Some of the more successful and popular ones, such as Ein Herz und eine Seele (1973-1976), a loose adaptation of the British series Till Death Us Do Part (BBC1 1965-1975), may not be immediately recognizable as an adaptation, and some of them, such as Lindenstrasse (ARD 1985-2020) or Gute Zeiten Schlechte Zeiten RTL 1992-) may have long surpassed the broadcast period of the original and therefore have become shows in their own right.