The article first locates Deutschland in the broader TV fiction industry in Germany. In interpreting the interviews with methods suggested by Ulrike Nagel and Michael Mauser 21 and Hanne Bruun, 22 and, more generally, with perspectives from critical media industry and production studies, 23 the protocols on the participant observations are also used. Furthermore, Winger and others discussed Deutschland in lectures at these events and helped the researcher remain up to date regarding this series’ advancement. These observations are a vital complement to the interviews, as they ensure the researcher does not (co)produce the analysed industry discourse too much.
18 Additionally, and in connection with a broader production study, 19 my participant observations at multi-day industry workshops 20 on series production (from 2015 to 2019) are taken into account. 13 Between 20, I conducted them with key executives and creatives involved in Deutschland: Jörg Winger, the leading writer-producer, or creator 14 Ulrike Leibfried, the commissioning editor for the commercial channel RTL for its first season 15 Joachim Kosack, CEO of the production house UFA 16 and two of the directors, Edward Berger 17 and Florian Cossen. Methodologically, this article relies on expert interviews. 12 Furthermore, the series has transnationalised in its own course of development, as we will see. Deutschland has helped to initiate a taste for German TV fiction in English-speaking markets and potentially kickstarted what has been termed a ‘German TV Renaissance’ by the Guardian. What is it that makes such ready-made fictional television go transnational, according to the involved practitioners and in this specific case? This show, which follows an East German spy in the West German Armed Forces during the Cold War, is a particularly fruitful example to explore this question. At its centre is a case study of Deutschland. With a corresponding focus on production-specific and textual aspects, my article takes a closer look at the current industry discourse on the transnational circulation of German series. The above-quoted title of the panel certainly reflects these emphases by containing two examples: ‘showrunners’, describing the leading writer-producers with ‘managerial oversight’, 11 on the side of production and ‘antiheroes’, as a textual feature.
8 Public statements by practitioners 9 and papers that circulate in the industry 10 indicate that ‘quality TV’ has been especially understood through textual characteristics of certain US series and through their reported production methods, which are said to differ from the ones used in Germany. Besides German-language academia 6 and the feuilleton, 7 German TV professionals have taken up the discussion of such television and the Anglicism linked to it. 4 These negotiations have continued earlier debates on German cinema and its arguable lack of ‘international’ appeal 5 and have been accompanied by an evaluation discourse on so-called quality TV. In the last decade, similar discussions have been raised in the television industry and trade magazines, 3 as well as in television criticism and the feature pages of newspapers. The unofficial Berlinale event, where industry attendees applauded this news, and the following media coverage on the US export of Deutschland 83, 2 are just a few examples of the recent, ongoing discourse on the transnational circulation of German TV drama. Also during the festival, its sale to the US – a market particularly valued in a Western, transnational context – was announced. ‘Showrunners and Antiheroes – What Does the German Series Need for International Success?’ 1 was the title of an industry panel held adjacent to the 2015 Berlin International Film Festival, or Berlinale, at which the first season of the espionage coming-of-age drama Deutschland (2015-2020) premiered.