II am a radio film critic and I do interviews with film stars. My job involves drinking a lot of coffee. Especially a lot of bad coffee. In the cinema, while waiting for interviews with random actors and actresses or directors in faceless luxury hotels, people like to have lukewarm filter coffee brewed in the morning in thermos flasks that are peeling off the paint. Or those from capsule coffee machines, the operation of which requires at least a university degree if you want milk as well as coffee. There were often three or four of us standing in front of steaming, smoking machines, which often simply had no water, no milk or neither one nor the other.
The stars, on the other hand, drink exquisite drinks. Ryan Gosling, for example, a bright green smoothie, Scarlett Johansson tomato juice with Tabasco. Half Fiji water. Because Madonna drank it once. Or something like that. How many times have I seen a star come into the room, sit down, be asked by press relations if he would like a coffee, which was answered in the affirmative, the coffee was brought in the middle of a conversation, but then never touched and lonely, was left cold and stale after the interview. Only to repeat the game in the next room in front of the next journalist 15 minutes later.
Incidentally, Frederik Lau once mistook me for the waitress at the German Film Awards and instead of answering my questions, he ordered a beer from me – an occupational hazard.
The actress Mala Emde asked if she could make me a coffee
The other day though, I had to team up with a star to get coffee. That was at the film festival in Venice – the festival with the best coffee in international comparison, after all Venice is in Italy. The espresso between the films is mandatory anyway, ranging between one and two euros. The coffee, which is supposed to be about, was free. In two ways.
I was on the festival grounds for an interview with the actress Mala Emde, known from the series “Charité”, “303” and most recently “Oh Hell”, who was awarded the “Bisato d’Oro” here in Venice in 2020 for her role in “And tomorrow the whole world”. This time she was in town for the world premiere of Out of My Skin, a sci-fi romance that tends to drink tea rather than coffee. But that’s another topic. The film was shown in a side row at the festival, so this time the interviews didn’t go to the luxury hotel, but to a garden: “Headquarter Settimana – Casa della Critica” was in the interview confirmation. Sounds like a villain’s headquarters. Or similar. It was a simple garden in front of a slightly run-down villa, the press corner was marked by a plastic table with plastic chairs. Everything seemed a bit improvised, but loving. Around the corner from the villa, the film team around Mala Emde, Jonas Dassler and the brothers Dimitri and Alex Schad alternately gave interviews. Those who weren’t there just hung out, smoked, drank, tried to calm their nerves until the premiere the next day.
Otherwise he prefers smoothies: Ryan Gosling 2018 at the Venice Film Festival
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Bild: picture alliance
On the edge of a garden table belonging to the group “very shaky” was a pile of plastic: mugs, half-full water bottles, a white capsule coffee maker surrounded by coffee stains, category “I’ve seen better days”. But still, it was festival day five and I had just gotten over a stomach flu: you guessed it, the longing for caffeine was great, desperation seemed to be in my eyes. I stood overwhelmed, overwhelmed, looking for cups in front of the machine, wondering whether the extension cords that had been connected in series here would survive an espresso or whether the whole fuse and then the villa would blow up (I I must have seen too many movies.
Then Mala Emde joined me and asked if she could make me a coffee. In a mixture of festival helplessness and being overwhelmed, I gratefully accepted and secretly grinned at the role reversal. Normally I make the coffee for my interview partners. festival madness. Wrong world. It doesn’t matter, everything is there – except for cups.
We were looking for these small white pieces of cardboard, in which the espresso doesn’t really taste good and which, after drinking, still have this sugar substitute on the bottom that you never get to lick out with dignity, but which at least prevent you from automatically getting the mouth burns. What we found are just a couple of proper plastic cups, which is what Aperol Spritz is mostly served in Venice.
Mala and I looked at each other questioningly. Will the hot espresso melt the cup or do the Italians have a secret recipe or more stable cups than we do? The spirit of discovery in us prevailed, so we pushed aside the skepticism and fear of second-degree burns. Capsule in, lever down, button pressed. The cup stood. The first espresso dribbled, then flowed – and the cup melted.
In a matter of seconds, my dream of quick caffeine was gone, the cup shrunk in half, contracting like a ping-pong ball that had been bathed too hot. A mixture of burnt plastic particles and greasy espresso spilled onto the floor. The impressive work of art immediately ended up in the garbage. We both refrained from having a hot drink together. By the way, we recently caught up on the real coffee. In my Kreuzberg office with a portafilter machine. Cappuccino with oat milk. In Italy we probably would have been crucified anyway.