ABSTRACT
Having made more than 1,000 films for television, Peter von Zahn is one of the legends of German TV history. He was one of the pioneers of the first trial operations of radio and television in Hamburg (NWDR), and he became the head of the text department as early as July 1945. His characteristic reportage style was very much influenced by Anglo-American journalism. He was sent to the United States by the NWDR as a result of conflicts with Chancellor Konrad Adenauer about his independent radio commentaries. There he started with his TV reports, Berichte aus der neuen Welt/Reports from the New World in 1955. He reported with his typical, high-pressured voice about daily life and his family’s experiences in this modern society. These stories set standards for reportage and documentary in early German television. His style was a mixture of the features that he had made for radio and the American style of reporting represented by Edward R. Murrow, Fred Firendly, and others. This style was primarily oriented to text and content and then looked for the images needed to illustrate it. It stands in sharp contrast to the newsreels and the cultural films of the Third Reich period, which concentrated strongly on the image and dynamic
editing. His personal features, which were broadcast once a month, shaped the image of the United States in postwar Germany. Beside the series Berichte aus der neuen Welt,
von Zahn also created a series called Bilder aus der farbigen Welt/Images from the Colourful World, where he presented political topics from Africa, South America, and Asia and showed the clash between modern industrialization and traditional cultures. He built a wordwide network of journalists working for his own Washington-based company, Documentary Programs Inc. The idea was to report on the same topic from different countries and thus provide a deeper perspective. In October 1961, he started the weekly series Reporter der Windrose/Reporter of the Wind Rose and reported from different regions in the world to bring them into German homes. The idea was for audiences to learn about and see something from the countries and cultures outside of Europe. It was the first attempt at a regular broadcast on foreign affairs subjects. The goal was to analyze the structure of the societies in the modern world and to compare developments. The first program had the title People on the Move and presented case studies of people moving to the huge cities and
political emigrants, as well as economic migration and holidays in sunny places. After 104 programs and two years of intensive work, the stations decided to terminate the series and begin using their own foreign correspondents in different countries. Peter von Zahn also produced portraits of important statesman like Ben Gurion, which brought him the Grimme Prize in 1964. Besides shaping the documentary work of the
SDR (Stuttgarter Schule), Peter von Zahn successfully established another journalistic style in German television, which was influenced by the radio essays and Anglo-American school of reporting. He produced many more films until 1993, when at 80 years of age, he decided to withdraw from active filmmaking but still published columns as a journalist and wrote his memoirs. He is seen as one of the pioneers and legends of German television.
