Nina Kunzendorf takes a taxi to the Berliner Verlag in Berlin-Kreuzberg. We want to talk to her about the series “House of Dreams” in which she plays the wife of Arthur Grünberg, who founded the Jonass department store in Berlin in the late 1920s, Germany’s first credit department store. On December 20th and 21st, RTL will show three episodes of the first season. The second season will be available on RTL+ from December 20th.
Ms. Kunzendorf, by the way, we come from the same area, you from Mannheim, I from Heidelberg.
No!
And!
But you don’t hear that at all.
I can do it, right.
I can do it aa. And actually I always hear that immediately. The slightest hint.
But you can’t hear it either.
I never spoke that at home either. My mom is Swabian, my dad originally from Dresden. We spoke High German to each other. I just sucked that up at school.
My parents spoke dialect, but the teachers told them they wanted to speak High German with us children. In the 1970s dialect had a very bad reputation.
And I like that so much. I love listening to dialects.
In “House of Dreams” there is a lot of Berliners. In the series you play a woman in her 50s whose husband is cheating on her with a younger woman. Not only does she tolerate the affair, she even supports him in setting up his department store. The series is set in the 1920s. That wouldn’t happen today, would it?
I doubt that, to be honest. I believe that there are many stories that cannot be explained by putting them in history. When I think about couple confusion, affairs, double lives and what some people can endure in a relationship. I think it’s the same today. That stands the test of time.
Did you like the role?
Yes, I liked her. Because she gave me the opportunity to explore her. One could easily have been seduced into simply playing the betrayed wife. But together with Alexander Scheer and the director Sherry Hormann I tried to tell this character multidimensionally, to find nuances, different colors. She is very warm with her son, but even when it comes to marriage, you don’t think after two minutes: No wonder they hit the wall. Something is still alive. I like a role when it challenges me. And that’s how I felt about the role of Alice Grünberg.
The series could be described as another flowering of the Berlin 20s hype. What do you associate with this time?
You immediately have associations with dancing on the volcano, boisterous parties, drugs. But my thought in connection with “House of Dreams” was rather: The First World War had just ended, there was misfortune, loss, injury, hunger, people who remained in the war. That was what interested me the most, this area of tension, this underbody.
The main stage in “House of Dreams” belongs to the young actresses, but there are surprisingly many older or old actresses who could have been cast at a young age. Could that be because a woman directed this?
As for my character, that’s about the age that this role calls for. However, Alexander Scheer, who plays my husband, is a few years younger than me. He’s maybe 46, I’m 51. That’s certainly still unusual on German television. Traditionally, it is still the case that younger women are put alongside men. Roles for women over 40, 45 are few and far between anyway. I’m busy, but really good roles are becoming rare.
Nina Kunzendorf
Nina Kunzendorf, born in 1971, grew up in Mannheim. She did her acting training at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Hamburg, after which she had several engagements in the theater. From 2011 she worked alongside Joachim Król as a “Tatort” commissioner for the Hessian Broadcasting Corporation. For her role in Christian Petzold’s feature film “Phoenix” she received the German Film Award for Best Supporting Actress. In 2021 she starred in the third season of the ARD historical series “Charité” as the pediatrician Ingeborg Rapoport.
So aging is a problem in your job, but you just relaxedly mentioned your age, 51.
Why not? I’m fine with that, privately anyway. However, growing old in my job is not easy. You look at your own decay, so to speak, the HD technology is merciless. Of course I often think: Oh dear, I look like an 800-year-old turtle. More than that, however, I’m concerned with how dramatically the presence of women on the screen decreases as they get older. At most, they may be appendages of grandchildren, animals or husbands.
The fact that roles are rare for actresses your age has to do with the fact that the stories don’t exist.
I think it’s downright stupid not to tell more stories starring over-45s. The fundus for this would be so rich! I’m certainly not a better actress than I was 20 or 30 years ago, but I definitely have more experience. You have had children or not, you have ruined relationships, you have experienced ups and downs.
Why are there so few stories about women of this age?
Oh, I think it has something to do with a certain notion of attractiveness. There are often great books, and then the broadcaster says: we think it’s really beautiful, but we’d like to cast younger people. Maybe it’s also an attempt to generate a younger audience again, including from public broadcasters. But I doubt that this works. First of all, the viewers are all older and my children and their friends, for example, don’t watch German television. I doubt you can seduce them.
Bascha Mika wrote in her book about getting older that from a certain age, a minus sign is placed in front of each year, i.e. each year means a deduction from the overall grade. But only for women. Men should grow old without losing their attractiveness.
That’s correct. But men over 50 don’t have it that easy either.
You mean in your shop?
Yes. But they still have it easier than women. But even for actors of that age, the range of roles is thin. And I’m always happy like a schnitzel when I see a story like that. Like the other day, a miniseries starring Kate Winslet, who’s only a few years younger than me.
Nina Kunzendorf in the role of Alice Grünberg in the historical drama “House of Dreams”RTL
How does Mrs. Nina Kunzendorf feel about getting older?
I would argue that I am much more empowered today. That I have more self-confidence because I know better what interests me and what doesn’t. I have a more focused view of the essentials.
Would you say that the fixation on erotic capital, as Pierre Bourdieu calls it, has increased in recent years?
I’m afraid it’s always been like this. And you apply the most critical standards to yourself. I am not free from any vanity. Of course, when you’re 50 you don’t look like you did when you were 30. A while ago I had my lenses replaced because my vision was really bad. When I saw myself in the mirror for the first time after the operation, I thought: Oh, I didn’t really want to know that exactly. But what exactly is attractiveness? Sherry Hormann, the director of block one of House of Dreams, is a good example. She’s a tad older than me and she’s such a beautiful woman. And by that I don’t just mean the outside, of course. I find many people beautiful, no matter how old they are. Eroticism and attractiveness are fed from many sources. I have trouble with super operated people. Mostly these are women. I don’t really like seeing Nicole Kidman anymore, because I only see a face. I find that terribly unattractive.
So you wouldn’t have the surgery?
Let’s put it this way: I hope not! I hope I’m fed with enough confidence and composure to give my wrinkles a warm welcome. You are also a role model, we will not achieve any change if we do not ensure unoperated visibility.
How did you actually get from Mannheim to Berlin?
I went to drama school in Hamburg and then had my first engagement at the theater in Mannheim. Later I played at the Schauspielhaus in Hamburg, then I was at the Kammerspiele in Munich, then three years in the countryside of Upper Bavaria.
In the countryside? How did that happen?
My children were very small, I was no longer a regular at the theater and finding an apartment for a family of four that is big and beautiful in Munich is incredibly difficult because the housing market there is so obscene. And then, purely by accident, the opportunity to rent a house in the country presented itself. And from there I moved to Berlin with my children. That was eleven or twelve years ago.
And?
I don’t want to leave here anymore. There is no other big city in Germany that can keep up with Berlin for me. I liked being in Hamburg, Munich wasn’t my favorite city. But when I was filming there the other day, I really enjoyed being there. It was so beautiful, so clean, nothing had changed. But I wouldn’t want to live there. I like Berlin. Also the big one. A lot of people who don’t live here say that Berlin is so huge. That’s it. But above all, you stay in your neighborhood. In a small circle within the big one. I also get along with the Berliners. I know they are often material and unfriendly, but I prefer that to what is supposedly friendly, which often hides something crooked. In Munich I always thought whether I’m in Schwabing or in Haidhausen or Bogenhausen – it doesn’t make that much of a difference. It’s different in Berlin. Schöneberg is not Friedrichshain, it is not Pankow and it is not Moabit. And I think that’s great.
I see many people who were total Berlin fans becoming tired of the city as they get older. The same goes for many New Yorkers.
I have a place to live in the country and I consider that a great luxury. In Munich everyone always says that the surrounding area is so beautiful. Which is absolutely true. But the area around Berlin is also wonderful. Really gorgeous. I have the balancing act between country and city.
Do you need that to get along with Berlin?
I would get along with Berlin even without staying in the country. I just take it as a great gift to have silence around me and to see the horizon. But I’m mainly in Berlin. I have school age children, 15 and 17.
Nina Kunzendorf (left) as Alice Grünberg clink glasses with her husband Arthur (Alexander Scheer), next to him his lover (Valery Tscheplanowa).RTL
Are the two involved in Fridays for Future?
Not active at the moment. The interest is there, the attention, the political awareness. But we are all a bit overwhelmed by all the crises around us. I see from my children and also from myself that these last few years have been exhausting. A lot was and is expected of young people in particular. The restrictions imposed by Corona, the climate crisis, now the war. I think it’s healthy to catch your breath every now and then.
Do you have a favorite area in Berlin?
I’m a friend of the old west. Charlottenburg, Schöneberg, I think it’s wonderful. I love Kantstrasse. A pub, a restaurant at the other, lively, colorful. I really like that.