Achtung, baby. Deutschland 83, the highly-anticipated new German-language spy thriller, is about to debut on a telly near you.
Created by American author Anna Winger (This Must Be the Place) and her German producer husband Joerg Winger (SOKO Leipzig), Deutschland 83 is an intense, gripping, heart-pounding coming-of-age thriller set against the real culture wars and political events of Germany in the 1980s. (Note the use of the kick-Arsch ’80s tune “Blue Monday” by New Order in the trailer.)
The drama unfolds just as the Cold War between East and West comes to a head, and follows 24-year-old Martin Rauch (Jonas Nay, Tatort), an East Germany native, as he is pulled from the world he knows and sent to the West as an undercover spy for the Stasi foreign service. His task while hiding in plain sight in the West German army: gather the secrets of NATO’s military strategy.
Everything is new, nothing is quite what it seems, and everyone Martin encounters is harboring both personal and political secrets, not the least of whom is Martin himself.
Costars in Deutschland 83 include Maria Schrader (Aimee & Jaguar) as Lenora Rauch, Martin’s aunt and boss and the Cultural Attaché at the East German Embassy; Alexander Beyer (War and Peace) as Tobias Tischbier, Martin’s mentor in the HVA (Foreign Arm of the East German Secret Service); Sonja Gerhardt (Bukow and König) as Annett Schneider, Martin’s fiancée and childhood sweetheart back home in Kleinmachnow; Ludwig Trepte (1864) as Alex Edel, the rebellious son of General Edel who is forced into a military career against his will; Lisa Tomaschewsky (Bukow and König) as Yvonne Edel, General Edel’s talented daughter, who rebels by joining the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh cult; Ulrich Noethen (Hannah Arendt) as General Wolfgang Edel, a West German official with top secret intel who is Martin’s boss in the Bundeswehr; and Sylvester Groth (Inglourious Basterds) as Walter Schweppenstette, Lenora’s boss and a senior figure in the HVA (East German Secret Service) hierarchy.
The eight-part Deutschland 83 had its exclusive world premiere during the inaugural Berlinale Special Series at the 65th Berlinale International Film Festival. It is executive produced by UFA Fiction’s Joerg Winger and Nico Hofmann (Donna Leon’s Commissario Brunetti), and directed by Edward Berger (Bukow and König) and Samira Radsi (Hamburg Dockland). The series is a UFA Fiction production for RTL Television in Germany, co-produced by SundanceTV in the US.
Deutschland 83 premieres Wednesday, 17 June 2015, at 11 PM ET/PT on SundanceTV.
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