Hand aufs Herz
Encyclopedia
Hand aufs Herz is a German television
soap opera
and premiered on October 4, 2010 on the private broadcasting station Sat.1
. It got canceled in June 2011, announcing the series finale for September 5, 2011. However that changed when Sat.1 decided to drop the show from it's line-up and sixx
was announced to air the remaining episodes; with a one-hour series finale on September 2, 2011.
The show focuses around a fictional high school in Cologne
and tackles with young love, a marriage crisis, a mysterious disappearance, schemes and competition fights, coming out
, drug abuse
, career chances and forbidden feelings. Hand aufs Herz also introduces something completely new to the genre of a soap opera by including music and dance as one of the main elements.
It has been compared to the successful American television show Glee
and the High School Musical
franchise. Even though it started out as a musical series, the show shifts it's stories from that plot even though it remains a part of the series.
Hand aufs Herz started two weeks after the failed daily drama Eine wie keine aired its final episode due to low ratings. The show is in direct competition with the long-running soap opera Verbotene Liebe
(Forbidden Love) and is starring with Vanessa Jung
and Andreas Jancke two of its former stars.
It was created by the writer/producer Petra Bodenbach. The show also aired in Austria
on ORF1
on schedule with the airing in Germany.
, Beate Vogel (Vanessa Jung
) becomes the new music and singing teacher at her former school, the Pestalozzi comprehensive school. On her first day of work she literally crashes into her new colleague Michael Heisig (Andreas Jancke), leading to a first encounter that begins a journey. Though, not everyone is in happy at the idea of Beate's return to the school where she once was a student. The sports coach turns out to be Bea's former schoolmate Alexandra Lohmann (Verena Mundhenke), who holds Beate responsible for the mysterious disappearance of her sister.
Alexandra and the vice principal, Julian Götting (Sebastian Hölz), plot against Bea and her mentor Gabriele Krawcyk (Marie Schneider), the principal of the Pestalozzi comprehensive school. Furthermore, Julian has his own motives in helping Alexandra as he's actively after Gabriele's job.
When Bea takes a look at the school choir
, she soon learns that much has changed at her former school. What was once the flagship activity has now been pushed aside by the beach volleyball
team. Nevertheless, Beate is excited when she learns that a student, Luzi Beschenko (Selina Müller), wants to form a music study group together with her fellow students Dennis Horstfeld (Dennis Schigiol) and Emma Müller (Kasia Borek). They only need a teacher to supervise the group.
With much enthusiasm, Bea decides to make the music study group her first project. Much to the anger of Caro Eichkamp (Sonja Bertram), the it girl
of the school and star of the beach volleyball team, who thinks the formation of a music study group will lessen the influence she has at the school. Together with her best friend Sophie (Franciska Friede), she tries to manipulate and expose the newly formed study group.
After a first long day of work, Beate spends the evening at a club called "Chulo’s" with her best friend Miriam (Caroline Maria Frier), the wife of her brother Piet (Oliver Petszokat). This is where she meets the attractive young Ben Bergmann (Christopher Kohn). Bea and Ben spend a passionate night together. However, Beate gets the shock of her life when Ben is introduced to her as one of her new students. A dangerous fiery game begins, in which Ben is still fascinated by Bea, even though she's his teacher.
(Forbidden Love).
Hand aufs Herz had a huge following online; making it difficult to get an audience through television. The series had high numbers in the online viewings, making nearly 50 percent of it's entire audience. When the show was difficult, fans were outraged and disappointed through various fan boards and let the industry know how much they loved the show.
German television
Television in Germany began in Berlin on March 22, 1935, broadcasting for 90 minutes three times a week. The German television market had approximately 36.5 million television households in 2000, making it the largest television market in Europe...
soap opera
Soap opera
A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...
and premiered on October 4, 2010 on the private broadcasting station Sat.1
Sat.1
Sat.1 is a privately owned German television broadcasting station. Sat.1 was the first privately owned television broadcasting station in Germany, having started one day before RTL Television....
. It got canceled in June 2011, announcing the series finale for September 5, 2011. However that changed when Sat.1 decided to drop the show from it's line-up and sixx
Sixx
sixx is a German commercial television station specialised for women. The channel is distributed via cable and satellite and was launched on 7 May 2010 at 20:15.- Current Foreign series :* 90210* Brothers & Sisters...
was announced to air the remaining episodes; with a one-hour series finale on September 2, 2011.
The show focuses around a fictional high school in Cologne
Cologne
Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...
and tackles with young love, a marriage crisis, a mysterious disappearance, schemes and competition fights, coming out
Coming out
Coming out is a figure of speech for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people's disclosure of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity....
, drug abuse
Drug abuse
Substance abuse, also known as drug abuse, refers to a maladaptive pattern of use of a substance that is not considered dependent. The term "drug abuse" does not exclude dependency, but is otherwise used in a similar manner in nonmedical contexts...
, career chances and forbidden feelings. Hand aufs Herz also introduces something completely new to the genre of a soap opera by including music and dance as one of the main elements.
It has been compared to the successful American television show Glee
Glee (TV series)
Glee is an American musical comedy-drama television series that airs on Fox in the United States, and on GlobalTV in Canada. It focuses on the high school glee club New Directions competing on the show choir competition circuit, while its members deal with relationships, sexuality and social issues...
and the High School Musical
High School Musical
High School Musical is a 2006 American television film, first in the High School Musical film franchise. Upon its release on January 20, 2006, it became the most successful film that Disney Channel Original Movie ever produced, with a television sequel High School Musical 2 released in 2007 and...
franchise. Even though it started out as a musical series, the show shifts it's stories from that plot even though it remains a part of the series.
Hand aufs Herz started two weeks after the failed daily drama Eine wie keine aired its final episode due to low ratings. The show is in direct competition with the long-running soap opera Verbotene Liebe
Verbotene Liebe
Verbotene Liebe , often abbreviated to VL, is a Rose d'Or Award-winning German television soap opera. The show was created by Reg Watson and first broadcast on Das Erste on 2 January 1995...
(Forbidden Love) and is starring with Vanessa Jung
Vanessa Jung
Vanessa Jung is a German actress.After school she went to New York and had a professional acting training. Before, she had a modern dance training in Munich....
and Andreas Jancke two of its former stars.
It was created by the writer/producer Petra Bodenbach. The show also aired in Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
on ORF1
ORF
ORF may refer to:* ORF , the Austrian public service broadcaster.* Open reading frame, a portion of the genome.* The IATA airport code for Norfolk International Airport in Norfolk, Virginia.* ORF format , Olympus raw image file format....
on schedule with the airing in Germany.
Plot
After finishing her schooling in MunichMunich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
, Beate Vogel (Vanessa Jung
Vanessa Jung
Vanessa Jung is a German actress.After school she went to New York and had a professional acting training. Before, she had a modern dance training in Munich....
) becomes the new music and singing teacher at her former school, the Pestalozzi comprehensive school. On her first day of work she literally crashes into her new colleague Michael Heisig (Andreas Jancke), leading to a first encounter that begins a journey. Though, not everyone is in happy at the idea of Beate's return to the school where she once was a student. The sports coach turns out to be Bea's former schoolmate Alexandra Lohmann (Verena Mundhenke), who holds Beate responsible for the mysterious disappearance of her sister.
Alexandra and the vice principal, Julian Götting (Sebastian Hölz), plot against Bea and her mentor Gabriele Krawcyk (Marie Schneider), the principal of the Pestalozzi comprehensive school. Furthermore, Julian has his own motives in helping Alexandra as he's actively after Gabriele's job.
When Bea takes a look at the school choir
Choir
A choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...
, she soon learns that much has changed at her former school. What was once the flagship activity has now been pushed aside by the beach volleyball
Beach volleyball
Beach volleyball, or sand volleyball, is an Olympic team sport played by two teams of two players on a sand court divided by a net.Like volleyball, the object of the game is to send the ball over the net in order to ground it on the opponent’s court, and to prevent the same effort by the opponent....
team. Nevertheless, Beate is excited when she learns that a student, Luzi Beschenko (Selina Müller), wants to form a music study group together with her fellow students Dennis Horstfeld (Dennis Schigiol) and Emma Müller (Kasia Borek). They only need a teacher to supervise the group.
With much enthusiasm, Bea decides to make the music study group her first project. Much to the anger of Caro Eichkamp (Sonja Bertram), the it girl
It girl
"It girl" is a term for a young woman who possess the quality "It", absolute attraction.The early usage of the concept "it" in this meaning may be seen in a story by Rudyard Kipling: "It isn't beauty, so to speak, nor good talk necessarily. It's just 'It'."...
of the school and star of the beach volleyball team, who thinks the formation of a music study group will lessen the influence she has at the school. Together with her best friend Sophie (Franciska Friede), she tries to manipulate and expose the newly formed study group.
After a first long day of work, Beate spends the evening at a club called "Chulo’s" with her best friend Miriam (Caroline Maria Frier), the wife of her brother Piet (Oliver Petszokat). This is where she meets the attractive young Ben Bergmann (Christopher Kohn). Bea and Ben spend a passionate night together. However, Beate gets the shock of her life when Ben is introduced to her as one of her new students. A dangerous fiery game begins, in which Ben is still fascinated by Bea, even though she's his teacher.
Cast
The protagonist was without a doubt Vanessa Jung in her part as teacher Bea Vogel, who had a forbidden love affair with her student, Ben Bergmann, played by Christopher Kohn. While Sebastian Hölz as Julian Götting, Verena Mundhenke as Alexandra Lohmann and Dennis Schigiol as Hotte Horstfeld left the series early, others were added to the main cast. Most important newcomers through the series were Lucy Scherer as Jenny Hartmann, who was involved in a popular lesbian storyline with Emma Müller, played by Kasia Borek, and Kim-Sarah Brandts as Michael's wife Helena.| Actor | Character | Duration |
|---|---|---|
| Sonja Bertram | Caro Eichkamp | 2010-2011 |
| Kasia Borek | Emma Müller | 2010-2011 |
| Hendrik Borgmann | Frank Peters | 2011 |
| Kim-Sarah Brandts | Helena Schmidt-Heisig | 2011 |
| Ulrich Drewes | Stefan Bergmann | 2010-2011 |
| Franciska Friede | Sophie Klein | 2010-2011 |
| Caroline Maria Frier | Miriam Vogel | 2010-2011 |
| Frederic Heidorn | Ronnie Peters | 2011 |
| Sebastian Hölz | Julian Götting | 2010-2011 |
| Andreas Jancke | Michael Heisig | 2010-2011 |
| Vanessa Jung Vanessa Jung Vanessa Jung is a German actress.After school she went to New York and had a professional acting training. Before, she had a modern dance training in Munich.... |
Beate Vogel | 2010-2011 |
| Matthias Kofler | Bastian Heisig | 2010-2011 |
| Christopher Kohn | Ben Bergmann | 2010-2011 |
| Amelie Plaas Link | Lara Vogel | 2010-2011 |
| Selina Müller | Luzi Beschenko | 2010-2011 |
| Verena Mundhenke | Alexandra Lohmann | 2010-2011 |
| Oliver Petszokat | Piet Vogel | 2010-2011 |
| Lucy Scherer | Jenny Hartmann | 2011 |
| Dennis Schigiol | Dennis "Hotte" Horstfeld | 2010-2011 |
| Marie Schneider | Gabriele Krawczyk | 2010-2011 |
| Barbara Sotel | Karin Beschenko | 2010-2011 |
| Rocco Stark | Timo Özgül | 2010-2011 |
| Franziska Traub Franziska Traub - Life :Traub works as actress in German television. In Germany she became famous for her role in Ritas Welt.- Filmography :* 1993: Nachtschwester Kroymann* 1988: Die zweite Heimat – Chronik einer Jugend* 1995: Bohai, Bohau... |
Ingrid Jäger | 2010-2011 |
| Frank Ziegler | Bodo Wilhelmsen | 2011 |
Reception & Ratings
The show's first episodes were generally favorable reviewed, with some saying that the project was a bold move while others praised its realistic setting. However, viewers criticized the fact that the show's characters, other than Bea and Ben, showed signs of being stereotypes. Hand aufs Herz debuted with 1.29 million viewers and closed its first week with 1.19 million viewers; giving a constant performance in the ratings. The debut of the soap did not reflect in the ratings of its time-slot competitor Verbotene LiebeVerbotene Liebe
Verbotene Liebe , often abbreviated to VL, is a Rose d'Or Award-winning German television soap opera. The show was created by Reg Watson and first broadcast on Das Erste on 2 January 1995...
(Forbidden Love).
Hand aufs Herz had a huge following online; making it difficult to get an audience through television. The series had high numbers in the online viewings, making nearly 50 percent of it's entire audience. When the show was difficult, fans were outraged and disappointed through various fan boards and let the industry know how much they loved the show.