Harald Schmidt is 65 years old – but still has a lot to do outside of the hamster wheel. It will no longer become its own show.
65. Others have long since retired. Go fishing or walk the dog. They stand for hours in front of construction site fences or in the Tchibo and can’t get out of their favorite pub. Not like him!
Harald Schmidt turns 65 on August 18. As has just been reported in the press, he will then be entitled to a pension of 272 euros a month – an amount that he says he wants to collect “hard as nails”. Since the wealthy millionaire and native Swabian may have gained a lot for his retirement, he can enjoy his retirement completely relaxed. No appointments, no performances, no rush – and lots of time?
Lots to do off the hamster wheel
“Not true!” he protests in an interview with the editorial network Germany (RND). “I have to learn the lines. I did an evening at the Zurich Opera for the premiere of ‘Rheingold’. In the fall I’m playing an operetta in Vienna. And I’m also returning to the theater in Stuttgart. You see, I have more than enough to do . I’m just not on this hamster wheel anymore.”
Well, there’s also the part-time job as cruise director Oskar Schifferle in the ZDF series “Das Traumschiff”. Schmidt also works as a coach in the Amazon Prime format “One Mic Stand”, in which well-known comedians prepare other celebrities without show experience for comedy appearances.
In a way, he does it with his left hand: “I can encourage someone who has certain basic requirements to be world class. To put it bluntly: I get the last whistle talked about. It’s often just about confirmation and encouragement not to be discouraged.”
Schmidt, who doesn’t look a day younger, takes the 65 very calmly. “A dream age! If I had known how great it was, I would have turned 65 earlier. I can only recommend it.”
He is also in good health. “Toi, toi, toi! Which of course doesn’t mean that I could go out tomorrow and fall over. But since I’ve never done any sport, I don’t have any broken joints. An hour and a half after getting up I’m in top form. But I need this time then beautiful.”
From Dirty Harry to mockery
He was once the nation’s biggest and best gossip, feared and loved by intellectuals and the lower echelon alike. “Dirty Harry” they reverently called him, also chief cynic, doyen of the united German irony guild Gag & Grinsen (IGG) and unofficial umbrella organization president of the humor location Germany (“Der Spiegel”), hunter of mockery and so on.
It all started after graduating from the Hölderlin High School in Nürtingen near Stuttgart. That’s when young Schmidt knew that he wanted to be an actor, and after studying at the State University for Music and Performing Arts in Stuttgart (1978-1981) it became his learned profession.
He had his first appearance in 1978 as a wordless extra with the great theater man Claus Peymann in Anton Chekhov’s play “Three Sisters” at the Württemberg State Theater. From 1981 to 1985 he was with the Augsburg Municipal Theater, in the first role in “Nathan the Wise” he played a Mameluke who only had to say: “Just come in here!”. This has increased significantly over time.
From 1984 to 1989 he acquired his actual tools as a first-strike weapon in German TV entertainment at the Düsseldorf Kom(m)ödchen, where he was apprenticed to the great cabaret artist Lore Lorentz (1920-1994). After that he was fit for other tasks. In addition to the WDR game show “Psst” (1990-1995), he presented the satirical and comedy show “Schmidteinander” (1990-1994, also WDR) with the Austrian satirist Herbert Feuerstein (1937-2020). This format made the cheeky Schlacks Harald Schmidt a universally accepted TV personality.
Jokes that would be impossible today
He became a cult figure with his late night talk show “Harald Schmidt”, which was broadcast for 19 years from 1995 to 2014 on various channels (Sat. 1, Das Erste, Sky). His trademark: a cheeky, taboo-free and sometimes outrageous way of dealing with victims of fun. Some complained and went to court like ex-daily news spokeswoman Susan Stahnke (54). Schmidt’s Poland jokes led to foreign policy upsets until the talker was invited to Poland by the Polish ambassador and then gave up his mockery.
Here is a small selection of his sayings:
“Many Catholics would like to have sex more often, but only see their altar boys on Sundays.”
“Two Brits have reached the North Pole, the first women. Tomorrow it will be announced where they were going.”
“Ancient Greece reminds me a bit of Cologne. In both of them it’s considered good manners to be gay.”
“I don’t want to say that Hanover is in the middle of nowhere. But you can see it damn well from there.”
“The Magic Flute is by Mozart and not by Beate Uhse.”
“It’s wonderful that you can live out your defects on television and get paid for it.”
He is convinced that such cheekiness is history once and for all and tells RND: “Today my show would be canceled after a week. Every year on International Women’s Day I opened the show with the words: ‘Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Gentlemen, remember: Today is International Women’s Day. Put a rose in the cleaning water for your wife.’ Would be impossible today. The director would have to point out immediately that he cleans at home himself.”
Dirty Harry – this is Harald Schmidt’s page, which is known throughout Germany. That he also took part in feature films such as “Nich’ mit Leo” (1995), “Late Show” (1999) and “From Searching and Finding Love” (2005) by Helmut Dietl (1944-2015) and the inventor of the miniseries “Labaule & Erben” (2019) was also well known. On the other hand, he carefully kept his private life private. He has been in a relationship with his partner since his show “Schmidteinander”. The couple lives in the villa suburb of Marienburg in Cologne and has five children.
Cynical surface, human core?
He also doesn’t talk much about his charity work: he supports the Center Against Expulsions and is patron of the German Depression Aid Foundation. He used to scoff at that in the “Frankfurter Rundschau”: “Professor Hegerl told me that he had discovered a humanistic core in me beneath the cynical surface. I really liked that. Since then I’ve felt the same way.”
It is said that self-mockery is the art of pulling yourself through the cocoa so that it still tastes really good afterwards. In this respect, Harald Schmidt is a connoisseur. He has become more relaxed and cultivates a mild self-mockery that obviously does him good, for example when he judges himself that he is “basically someone who comes onto the stage and says: ‘Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Come on a woman at the doctor'”.
After a Schmidt appearance in the Munich Hinterhoftheater came the “Süddeutsche Zeitung” 2010 to the knowledgethat on stages like this “the people who protect us from becoming stupid in the media mature. Once they’re gone, all that’s left is drinking.” Dirty Harry would probably only add one word to that: Cheers!