Charité (Seasons 1 and 2)
Oct. 7th, 2019 05:12 pmTalking to ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
makamu has reminded me I've been meaning to write about Charité, the two seasons German tv show I marathoned about two months ago. It doesn't quite fill the Call the Midwife yearning of my soul, but it's a good historical show set in and and around a hospital, with interesting characters both fictional and historical, and it tries and often achieves complexity in both its seasons.
Said seasons are set apart by several decades, in two very different eras, and thus feature a completely different ensemble. What they share is that in both cases, there are important historical characters while the main pov character is fictional and female. (In the first season, this led to one review in one of our three most famous newspapers, the conservative one, complaining about the existence of said OC and some other female OCs, because, yeah, sure, there were female nurses, but why couldn't the be exclusively focused on the three (historical) male geniuses, and who cared about problems like abortions when there was tubercolosis to discuss anyway?) Note: female scriptwriters in both seasons, though male directors. Both seasons also are ensemble stories; there are several storylines and arcs in addition to the main pov's tale.
Our main location for both seasons: the titular legendary and still existing hospital in Berlin. It was founded by Friedrich Wilhelm I. of Prussia in the 18th century, but the late 19th century was when it gained its international reputation.
Season 1: starts in 1888 (the "Year of the three Emperors"). Historical characters: three future Nobel Prize winners, Robert Koch (discoverer of the tubercolosis virus, which at the time the season takes place makes him the "star" among the doctors, so to speak, but he's about to take a (historical) fall), Emil Behring (would discover the means to heal diphteria), Paul Ehrlich (worked with both Koch and Behring, was Jewish and the target of late 19th century antisemitism, which the show thematisizes) and Rudolf Virchow (no Nobel Prize, but lots of discoveries, see earlier entry about him and Bismarck, but note the show features Virchow in his old age, decades after the earlier event).
Fictional characters: our heroine Ida Lenze, a doctor's daughter who's interested in medicine herself but as a woman can't become a physician in Germany (the only university open to women who wanted to become doctors at the time was Zurich, which is a plot point) and has fallen on hard times; due to plot reasons in the pilot, she ends up as a nurse in the hospital. Sister Therese, who befriends and later falls in love with Ida. Nurse Edith, increasingly angry about the way the nursing staff are exploited without hardly any free time; future socialist and founder of forbidden unions. Head of nursing staff Martha, old fashioned religious authoritarian, but not a hypocrite. The two male OCs of plot relevance, though not with as much screen time as the women: Georg Tischendorf, student of medicine who actually is more interested in photography (and Ida), but under pressure of his family; Heinrich von Minckwitz, frat boy who gets expelled for irresponsible behavior but ends up with the press.
Makes a (historical) cameo: Arthur Conan Doyle, who comes for Tuberkulin, the medication against tubercolosis Koch claims he's discovered and stays to witness Virchow devastatingly exposing... but that would be telling.
( Spoilery remarks ensue. )
Season 2: starts in the middle of the second World War. Which immediately made me wonder: how would the show deal with the biggest elephant in the room, i.e. the way so many doctors weren't just used by the Third Reich but actively took part in Nazi "experimentation"? Would we only get one token Nazi with the rest of the ensemble being misunderstood idealists? If not, how would the "hospital show" format fit with that? And the answer is...
Historical characters: mainly Ferdinand Sauerbruch (surgeon of legend, who basically codified the "bad tempered genius surgeon" trope in its German edition and first was idealized and whitewashed, then vilified; we're currently at a both/and stage in terms of representation - I saw an exhibition about Sauerbruch at the current day Charité in August to testify for it); Margot Sauerbruch, his second wife, also a doctor; Max de Crinis, vile Nazi extraordinaire (google him and shudder); Maria Fritsch, Sauerbruch's secretary, secret resistance fighter (not made up, she was); Fritz Kolbe, her lover and later husband (also secret resistance fighter, ditto); Adolphe Jung (forcibly drafted doctor from the Elsass). There are also cameos from the infamous (Magda Goebbels) to the related to famous (Karl Bonhoeffer, father of Dietrich, former head of the Charité and friends with Sauerbruch.)
Fictional main characters: Anni Waldhausen, our main pov character this season, student at the Charité, married, pregnant, and at the start of the show true believer in Führer and Fatherland. She's writing her doctoral thesis about self-inflicted wounds by soldiers who want to escape military service, and the vile Max de Crinis positions himself as her mentor. (This is probably the biggest narrative gamble, but imo justified, as any series about doctors in the Third Reich which had only its villains as Nazis, after already staking the odds by using more ambigous or heroic historical characters than vile ones, would be cheating. Also you can bet Anni's main arc in this show isn't a romantic one. What she learns makes her, subtly and less subtly, a symbolic figure for the nation as well.) Artur Waldhausen, Anni's husband, has already finished his studies, is a fervent believer in Führer and Fatherland as well and at the start of the season begins working not just in the main hospital but in the outlying hospital, where they've found a "purpose" for "unwanted" disabled children which you can guess. Otto Marquardt, Anni's younger brother, wounded and just back from the front as the season starts; also half of this season's gay couple. Martin Schelling, male nurse (he's not on the front due to having a bad leg), falls in love with Otto (and unlike him is already under surveillance since as a teenager he once got caught at a gay encounter), the other half of the couple. Sister Käthe, at first glance salt-of-the-earth motherly character, at second glance wilfully blind because she does know that any child sent to the outlier hospital will not be seen again. Sister Christel, at first glance young and flirtatious, at second glance firm believer in the party, reports suspected disloyalty where she finds it and remains a Nazi till the end.
( Here be spoilers. )
All in all: a well-made show, available on Netflix, if you're not squeamish about the human body (both seasons feature operating scenes) and are ready for historical injustices (s1) or crimes (s2). I'll definitely watch the third season, which I hear will take place in the GDR of the early 1960s, when the Wall gets built.
makamu has reminded me I've been meaning to write about Charité, the two seasons German tv show I marathoned about two months ago. It doesn't quite fill the Call the Midwife yearning of my soul, but it's a good historical show set in and and around a hospital, with interesting characters both fictional and historical, and it tries and often achieves complexity in both its seasons. Said seasons are set apart by several decades, in two very different eras, and thus feature a completely different ensemble. What they share is that in both cases, there are important historical characters while the main pov character is fictional and female. (In the first season, this led to one review in one of our three most famous newspapers, the conservative one, complaining about the existence of said OC and some other female OCs, because, yeah, sure, there were female nurses, but why couldn't the be exclusively focused on the three (historical) male geniuses, and who cared about problems like abortions when there was tubercolosis to discuss anyway?) Note: female scriptwriters in both seasons, though male directors. Both seasons also are ensemble stories; there are several storylines and arcs in addition to the main pov's tale.
Our main location for both seasons: the titular legendary and still existing hospital in Berlin. It was founded by Friedrich Wilhelm I. of Prussia in the 18th century, but the late 19th century was when it gained its international reputation.
Season 1: starts in 1888 (the "Year of the three Emperors"). Historical characters: three future Nobel Prize winners, Robert Koch (discoverer of the tubercolosis virus, which at the time the season takes place makes him the "star" among the doctors, so to speak, but he's about to take a (historical) fall), Emil Behring (would discover the means to heal diphteria), Paul Ehrlich (worked with both Koch and Behring, was Jewish and the target of late 19th century antisemitism, which the show thematisizes) and Rudolf Virchow (no Nobel Prize, but lots of discoveries, see earlier entry about him and Bismarck, but note the show features Virchow in his old age, decades after the earlier event).
Fictional characters: our heroine Ida Lenze, a doctor's daughter who's interested in medicine herself but as a woman can't become a physician in Germany (the only university open to women who wanted to become doctors at the time was Zurich, which is a plot point) and has fallen on hard times; due to plot reasons in the pilot, she ends up as a nurse in the hospital. Sister Therese, who befriends and later falls in love with Ida. Nurse Edith, increasingly angry about the way the nursing staff are exploited without hardly any free time; future socialist and founder of forbidden unions. Head of nursing staff Martha, old fashioned religious authoritarian, but not a hypocrite. The two male OCs of plot relevance, though not with as much screen time as the women: Georg Tischendorf, student of medicine who actually is more interested in photography (and Ida), but under pressure of his family; Heinrich von Minckwitz, frat boy who gets expelled for irresponsible behavior but ends up with the press.
Makes a (historical) cameo: Arthur Conan Doyle, who comes for Tuberkulin, the medication against tubercolosis Koch claims he's discovered and stays to witness Virchow devastatingly exposing... but that would be telling.
( Spoilery remarks ensue. )
Season 2: starts in the middle of the second World War. Which immediately made me wonder: how would the show deal with the biggest elephant in the room, i.e. the way so many doctors weren't just used by the Third Reich but actively took part in Nazi "experimentation"? Would we only get one token Nazi with the rest of the ensemble being misunderstood idealists? If not, how would the "hospital show" format fit with that? And the answer is...
Historical characters: mainly Ferdinand Sauerbruch (surgeon of legend, who basically codified the "bad tempered genius surgeon" trope in its German edition and first was idealized and whitewashed, then vilified; we're currently at a both/and stage in terms of representation - I saw an exhibition about Sauerbruch at the current day Charité in August to testify for it); Margot Sauerbruch, his second wife, also a doctor; Max de Crinis, vile Nazi extraordinaire (google him and shudder); Maria Fritsch, Sauerbruch's secretary, secret resistance fighter (not made up, she was); Fritz Kolbe, her lover and later husband (also secret resistance fighter, ditto); Adolphe Jung (forcibly drafted doctor from the Elsass). There are also cameos from the infamous (Magda Goebbels) to the related to famous (Karl Bonhoeffer, father of Dietrich, former head of the Charité and friends with Sauerbruch.)
Fictional main characters: Anni Waldhausen, our main pov character this season, student at the Charité, married, pregnant, and at the start of the show true believer in Führer and Fatherland. She's writing her doctoral thesis about self-inflicted wounds by soldiers who want to escape military service, and the vile Max de Crinis positions himself as her mentor. (This is probably the biggest narrative gamble, but imo justified, as any series about doctors in the Third Reich which had only its villains as Nazis, after already staking the odds by using more ambigous or heroic historical characters than vile ones, would be cheating. Also you can bet Anni's main arc in this show isn't a romantic one. What she learns makes her, subtly and less subtly, a symbolic figure for the nation as well.) Artur Waldhausen, Anni's husband, has already finished his studies, is a fervent believer in Führer and Fatherland as well and at the start of the season begins working not just in the main hospital but in the outlying hospital, where they've found a "purpose" for "unwanted" disabled children which you can guess. Otto Marquardt, Anni's younger brother, wounded and just back from the front as the season starts; also half of this season's gay couple. Martin Schelling, male nurse (he's not on the front due to having a bad leg), falls in love with Otto (and unlike him is already under surveillance since as a teenager he once got caught at a gay encounter), the other half of the couple. Sister Käthe, at first glance salt-of-the-earth motherly character, at second glance wilfully blind because she does know that any child sent to the outlier hospital will not be seen again. Sister Christel, at first glance young and flirtatious, at second glance firm believer in the party, reports suspected disloyalty where she finds it and remains a Nazi till the end.
( Here be spoilers. )
All in all: a well-made show, available on Netflix, if you're not squeamish about the human body (both seasons feature operating scenes) and are ready for historical injustices (s1) or crimes (s2). I'll definitely watch the third season, which I hear will take place in the GDR of the early 1960s, when the Wall gets built.
