Englis-crimination. TV? Dutch only, aub

Unfortunately, the Big Film Quiz was on Dutch public broadcasting, so it had to be in Dutch. That’s just the way it is. I asked why, and it was explained to me: ‘the public broadcasters are aimed at, shall we say, higher educated viewers.’ So, of course, the commercial channels are for lower educated viewers. And, indeed, whenever I hear English on TV, it’s Paul Turner on ‘Voice of Holland,’ or Derek Ogilvie talking to dead people, or Dan Karaty on ‘So You Think You Can Dance.’ And they do the live shows, where they can’t even subtitle it. (Actually, they do try. Karaty will say something like ‘Nice technique, but I wanted to see more performance, more expression, more attitude, more wow, more swagger!’ …and the subtitle will come up a few seconds later: ‘Goed, maar kan beter.’)  

So, if the public channels in Nederland are aimed at higher-educated viewers, then why are the lower-educated viewers the only ones trusted to speak a second language?

In 2012, Pep Rosenfeld & I came close to being on Pauw en Witteman. Boom Chicago was asked to develop material for the 2012 election. Would we be willing to spend a bunch of hours developing & trying out material linking the Dutch election to the US election? Yes. And would we be willing to come in and try it out in the studio so the producers & Jeroen & Paul could see? Yes. Was it funny? ‘It was very funny,’ they explained. ‘It’s just… we want to wait until Leon de Winter is on the show. Then we’ll invite you.’ Winter came and went, and we’re still waiting.

To their credit, many producers in Dutch public broadcasting have had no problem putting me on TV. I was speaking English for NOS Election Night in 2000 with Boom Chicago. I was with Pep Rosenfeld on Barend en van Dorp in 2004. And we went on Twee voor Twaalf in 2008. And in 2012 I did my solo series ‘Verkiespijn’ in English on Vara HumorTV. Subtitled, no problem. I even interviewed Horace Cohen, who has American citizenship. I asked him if he was going to vote, and he said ‘Yes! Definitely. But how do you do it? At the Embassy on Museumplein?’ Technically, that’s the Consulate. And no, you can’t vote there. You have to request an absentee ballot and send it in. Horace replied, ‘Oh, well then no, I’m not going to vote.’ We agreed Obama could use a more motivational slogan. Horace suggested ‘Voting Made Easy.’ Or more like ‘Vote Obama, unless it’s too much trouble.’

I’ve come close to being on De Wereld Draait Door. The producer explained that they were getting complaints about having the same guests all the time. And in 2012, they wanted some people talking about America who were actually from America. A week before they were going to have me on, they tried some new faces at the table. Now they were getting complaints about too many guests they’d never heard of. I got bumped for Leon de Winter.

I teased the producer from De Wereld Draait Door about the No-English policy at the public broadcasters. She said, ‘It’s not just English. It’s any other language.’ A-ha! So there is a policy! She explained, ‘There’s no written rule that Dutch public broadcasters have to stick to Dutch. But there’s an unspoken rule that – if you’re accepting money from the Dutch government – then you’re expected to stick to the mother tongue.’ Dutch broadcasting, alias Le Academie Nederlandaise. I suppose that’s why I quite enjoyed it when Matthijs van Nieuwkerk invited guest-host Adrian van Dis to take over the show for Book Week. Adrian van Dis came on, and the first thing he did was switch language. First came the fluent German interview, and then the fluent English interview. 3 languages for the price of … less than Matthijs van Nieuwkerk. That was a pretty good deal.