Television and the Cold War in the German Democratic Republic

Revised Pages Envisioning Socialism Revised Pages Revised Pages Envisioning Socialism Television and the Cold War in the German Democratic Republic Heather L. Gumbert The University of Michigan Press Ann Arbor Revised Pages Copyright © by Heather L. Gumbert 2014 All rights reserved This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in any form (be- yond that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press), without written permission from the publisher. Published in the United States of America by The University of Michigan Press Manufactured in the United States of America c Printed on acid- free paper 2017 2016 2015 2014 5 4 3 2 A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN 978– 0- 472– 11919– 6 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978– 0- 472– 12002– 4 (e- book) Revised Pages For my parents Revised Pages Revised Pages Contents Acknowledgments ix Abbreviations xi Introduction 1 1 Cold War Signals: Television Technology in the GDR 14 2 Inventing Television Programming in the GDR 36 3 The Revolution Wasn’t Televised: Political Discipline Confronts Live Television in 1956 60 4 Mediating the Berlin Wall: Television in August 1961 81 5 Coercion and Consent in Television Broadcasting: The Consequences of August 1961 105 6 Reaching Consensus on Television 135 Conclusion 158 Notes 165 Bibliography 217 Index 231 Revised Pages Revised Pages Acknowledgments This work is the product of more years than I would like to admit. That it has finally seen the light of day, so to speak, is due to the support of a number of institutions and individuals. I began this project as a doctoral student at the University of Texas at Austin, where I received financial, collegial, and moral support. Generous gifts to the Department of History from Eugene and Dora Bonham, John Paul Jones, Alice J. D. Sheffield, and Gardner F. Marston funded early research. The Ber- lin Program for Advanced German and European Studies at the Freie Univer- sität Berlin and the Social Science Research Council supported my dissertation research, offered me a supportive and challenging institutional home while I was in Berlin, and introduced me to some of my closest friends and colleagues. The Zentrum für zeithistorische Forschung in Potsdam was a fount of generous and collegial scholars. Special thanks go to Christoph Klessmann and Thomas Lindenberger. Thanks to the members of my dissertation committee, David Crew, Peter Jelavich, Joan Neuberger, Tracie Matysik, and Sabine Hake; each one is a model scholar I can only hope to emulate. Virginia Tech has been my institutional home for almost a decade, through thick and thin. The Department of History and the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences have provided support invaluable research support through a number of travel and research grants and stipends. The Jerome Niles Faculty Research Fellowship supported the final writing of the manuscript. Thanks also to my friends and colleagues at Virginia Tech, with whom I have shared and surmounted far more than any of us could have imagined. I must acknowledge the support given by research professionals on two continents, without whom this work would not have been possible. I am in- debted to the friendly and dedicated staff of Inter- library Loan at Virginia Tech. The staffs of the German Federal Archives in Lichterfelde and Dahlwitz- Revised Pages x Acknowledgments Hoppegarten, the German Broadcasting Archives in Berlin- Babelsberg and Frankfurt, and the State Library of Berlin are credits to their profession. Dr. Ina Iske- Schwaen curates the archives of her late husband, Kurt Schwaen, and I especially thank her for her generosity (and hospitality) in sharing his life’s work. Thanks are also due to my family. Jane and J. Pat Stephens have cheer- fully encouraged me throughout the project. Thanks to my parents, John and Penny Gumbert, for their patience and support through what sometimes seemed an interminable task. I dedicate this book to them. My “Doktorvater” David Crew has offered unflagging encouragement that sustained me through the writing of the manuscript. I value tremendously his scholarship, his friendship, and his admonition to finally “finish it!” Finally, I thank my husband Robert Stephens for his encouragement, partnership, and confidence in me. Revised Pages Abbreviations ARD Arbeitsgemeinschaft der öffentlich- rechtlichen Rundfunkan- stalten der Bundesrepublik Deutschland BPO Betriebsparteiorganisation DDM East German Mark (currency) DEFA Deutsche Film- Aktiengesellschaft DFF Deutscher Fernsehfunk DFG Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft DIAS Drahtfunk im amerikanischen Sektor DM West German Mark (currency) DRA Deutsches Rundfunkarchiv FCC Federal Communications Commission FDGB Freier Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund FDJ Freie Deutsche Jugend FRG Federal Republic of Germany GDR German Democratic Republic HICOG United States High Commissioner in Germany ITV Independent Television MDR Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk MPF- BRF Ministerium für Post- und Fernmeldewesen— Bereich Rundfunk under Fernsehen NBC National Broadcasting Corporation NDR Norddeutscher Rundfunk NPR National Public Radio NWDR Nordwestdeutscher Rundfunk OIRT International Radio and Television Organization of Eastern Euro- pean states RIAS Rundfunk im amerikanischen Sektor Revised Pages xii Abbreviations SED Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands SKF Staatliches Komitee für Fernsehens SMAD Soviet Military Administration in Germany SRK Staatliches Rundfunkkomitee UHF Ultra- High Frequency VdK Verband deutscher Künstler VDK Verband Deutscher Komponisten und Musikwissenschaftler VHF Very High Frequency WDR Westdeutscher Rundfunk ZDF Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen ZPKK Zentrale Parteikontrollkommission / Central Party Control Com- mission ZZF Zentrum für zeithistorische Forschung Revised Pages Introduction I had been in the archive not more than a month when I found a peculiar fragment of the past. In the late 1950s the East German television service had received a letter from an enthusiastic viewer proposing the scenario for a new show. The action revolved around a strong, male protagonist who fought for justice, vigilante- style, settling scores in a manner akin to a cinematic gang- ster. Television staff had passed on this “riveting” piece of work, which they deemed as wholly inappropriate material. Though it was not more than a fragment— literally a scrap of paper— that I barely recorded in my archival notes, it was incongruous and yet evocative enough that I have remembered it for more than a decade. On the face of it, the letter is hardly evidence of any- thing, but it is highly suggestive of different threads found throughout this book. First, it suggests the emergence by this time of an active and interested audience willing to help shape the future of East German television programming. But, and this is a second important theme, the story this viewer sug- gested troubled television staff: with its lone wolf protagonist and abundant representation of violence, it flew in the face of the kind of stories the DFF had been trying to tell for some time, drawing instead from the narrative trea- sury of the capitalist West. Somehow, this clearly avid viewer had failed to get the message they sought to convey. This is a book about television and the power it exercised to define the ways in which authorities, audiences, artists, and others could envision what socialism meant in the German Democratic Republic (GDR). It traces how, when, and in what ways television emerged to become a medium prized for its communicative and entertainment value. It explores the difficulties GDR authorities had defining and executing a clear vision of the society they hoped to establish. It explains how television helped to stabilize GDR society in a way that ultimately worked against the utopian vision the authorities thought they were cultivating. To this end, this book considers television as a technology, an institution, and a medium (or mediator) of social relations and cultural Revised Pages 2 Envisioning Socialism knowledge; it examines television from the perspective of television produc- ers, audiences, technicians, and regulators; and it explores narratives by and about television. At first glance the GDR may not seem the most likely ground for a fruitful study of television and its power and influence in the postwar world. By the end of the Cold War, both the state and its television appeared to be woefully backward, the product of an older, authoritarian, boring, and less colorful time. GDR television was unmoved by the commercial television explosion of the 1980s that had resulted from the emergence of cable television, for example, and, since 1969, had offered programming on only two channels. By the time the Berlin Wall fell, the lion’s share of this programming was still broadcast in black and white. More important, popular and scholarly interpretations held that GDR television was both closely controlled by the state and unable to command significant audiences from among its own citizens.1 This picture fits with, and was shaped by, post- reunification scholarship on Germany that argued for the exceptional nature of the GDR in comparison with its normative West German other. In the 1990s, historians of the GDR revived “totalitarianism” as a way to explain the emergence, persistence, and subsequent end of the East German state. The fall of communism in Europe encouraged some historians to reassert

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