“At the begining, Verliebt in Berlin had more success than Good Times, Bad Times because there was a big hype about Lisa, the protagonist,” says the writer. “She had to wear a special fat suit that made her look fat, she would wear glasses, a wig and braces. But Lisa was always cuteugly, though – she had a childlike way to behave”, he remarks, referring to the fact that they kept some features from the original telenovela, but the adaptation was locally targetted. “The advantage of the Latin American world is that social differences are wider, so it’s easier to tell stories of differences there rather than in our society. We focused on the social differences, having our protagonist come from the suburbs, a small Eastern Germany town, and her beloved David lives in a big mansion in a plush part of Berlin.”

Betty, la fea is not a true telenovela, it is somewhat different from the common characteristics of the genre because it has many touches of comedy. “But there are so many departures from the genre: mafia stories, crime stories, historic and modern stories. We should have more different stories in Germany”.

What is the difference between the Latin American version of Julia and the German version, Bianca?
It’s a concept of typical telenovelas, but in our own productions you feel they are typically German because the audience knows the actors and the stories are the same that were written more than 200 years ago in Germany – they talk about a girl that falls in love with a rich man. The old fairy tales come from our own woods in Germany. This fairy tañe aspect is very romantic, very originally Germanic.The writer also writes dramas, but he says it is wonderful to write stories that you can see on screen the following week. "In our working team we are always discussing and talking, and something new always comes up."