The reality format "Celebrities under Palm Trees" (every Wednesday, 8:15 p.m. on Sat.1) arrives: The program, in which more or less well-known celebrities live together in a Thai villa and fight in games for a prize money of 100,000 euros , started on March 25 and was already able to celebrate quota successes: the first episode saw 2.82 million viewers (15.5 percent market share in the target group of 14 to 49 year olds), the second episode reached 3.27 million people (17.5 percent and the prime time win). But why does the new trash format score in the entertainment world?
Simple but effective concept
The show impresses with a simple concept that has already been used in other trash shows. Take a number of candidates with mostly questionable celebrity status, let them go at each other in a secluded villa and use small games to ensure variety among the spectators and competition among the residents. The shared flat life with arguments and bitchiness is reminiscent of the quarrelsome couples in the "Summer House of the Stars" or the nervously tense "Celebrity Big Brother" residents. The paradisiacal environment can keep up with the accommodation of "Bachelor in Paradise" and the games ensure discord like in the jungle camp.
Colorful candidate field
When selecting candidates, Sat.1 showed a good sense of trash. For one thing, the broadcaster invited a number of celebrities with format experience who are aware of their entertainment function. Among them the former "Celebrity Big Brother" couple Janine Pink (33) and Tobias Wegener (26), Carina Spack (23, "Bachelor in Paradise"), Ronald Schill (61, "Celebrity Big Brother"), Bastian Yotta (43 , Jungle Camp), Désirée Nick (63, Jungle Camp) and Claudia Obert (58, "Celebrity Big Brother").
They chat over a glass from their personal sewing boxes and tickle intimate secrets from their counterparts. On the other hand, Sat.1 caused conflict potential per se with the constellation of the participants, so there was already an escalating divorce dispute between Désirée Nick and Claudia Obert, to which the younger candidates in particular were horrified. Bastian Yotta's conclusion: "If I saw my mother on TV like this, I would be ashamed of myself." Is there a "young versus old" confrontation?
A show at the right time
"Celebrities under palm trees" not only fills a gap in the mostly dormant trash TV program, so that it could occupy a permanent place in the first half of the year. It also does this at a special time: Between news programs and special formats for the Corona crisis, the format ensures the diversion and variety that many TV viewers are currently longing for. The cat wars and zoffs in the Thailand flat share have their good points.