Viktor Giacobbo and Mike Müller need therapy. Why Giacobbo is far from retiring and why the audience becomes a shrink in "Giacobbo/Müller in Therapie".
The meeting room of the Casinotheater Winterthur is the ideal place for a brainstorming session. Completely free of office chichi à la Google. Tables, horseshoe-shaped chairs, lots of light - that's it. The rough form of "Giacobbo/Müller in Therapy" is ready. It is another co-production by the dream team of the Swiss comedy scene with Giacobbo, Müller and Domenico Blass (head writer for "Giacobbo/Müller").
event: How did the idea come about? Viktor: When our TV show was still running, we said to ourselves: Can't we bring this to the stage? Theater offers a more interesting opportunity to show the background on a different level.
Do you need treatment because you miss your SRF show? Mike: It's therapy in the broadest sense. Dominique Müller plays the therapist, or rather the therapy coach. He plays himself as an actor and director and claims to have additional training as an audience retrieval trainer. After television, we have to get used to a theater audience again. The audience is part of the therapy.
Public criticism was part of the success of "G/M."Do you miss that? Viktor: We claim that our therapists recommended the new play so that we could get over the self-imposed end of the show and get used to other circumstances again. Such claims are fun on the theater stage.
Do you regret the end of your show? Viktor: No, not for a minute! It was the right decision to stop, we loved doing it until the end.
Mike: I wanted to realize projects for the theater again, Viktor is planning film projects. We have the privilege of being able to do what we like to do.
Friends on stage and in private. Differences of opinion are rare with Giacobbo/Müller. (Photo: Holger Salach)
Why are you put in a corset in TV? Viktor: We'd decided what we were allowed to do. That was an agreement that already applied to "Viktor's Late Program". Of course, we always discussed it with our bosses, but we were able to decide in the end.
Mike: They had confidence in us, gave us artistic freedom and knew that if they interfered too much, we'd say goodbye. It was a win-win situation, we gave them good ratings and they gave us a playground.
Viktor: A simple recipe, I never understood why they didn't continue it.
Who should television give carte blanche to?
Viktor: Unteregger, Elsener, Mutzenbecher, Büsser, Vetter, Patti Basler and others. There are great talents who should be given the same artistic freedom that we had. If you just tell them what works and what doesn't, all their creativity is gone. You also have to give beginners the opportunity to fail - and that doesn't just apply to television.
You're currently working on a new play, Mike played the "mortician". What else are you doing, Viktor?
I'm working on film projects. One of them is a play I'm writing with Domenico Blass, like all my films and also "G/M in Therapie". It's another domestic comedy that also takes place abroad. Similar to "Serious Case in Havana".
Mike, you're currently touring with your solo play "Heute Gemeindeversammlung". Mike: Yes, I've been on the road with it since October and I'm having great fun. From April, I'll also be on the road with the new play, so I'll just be on the road.
Viktor, you've been an AHV recipient for a year now. Have you ever thought about only playing golf?
My feet fall asleep just thinking about it. The fact that the show ended at the same time as my retirement age is pure coincidence.
