Günter Kotte

Günter Kotte (born January 11, 1949 in Pirna ) is a German writer and director .

Life

Günter Kotte grew up with foster parents in the village of Bühlau (today part of Großharthau ) near Stolpen and went to primary school here. From 1964 to 1966 he attended the children's and youth sports school in Dresden and made it to the district champion in the 3000-meter obstacle course (1966) and the Olympic C-team.

At the age of 17, Günter Kotte broke off his career as a competitive athlete in 1966 and worked at times as a waiter in the Lindengarten in Dresden and as a sports reporter for the Dresden daily newspaper Sächsische Latest Nachrichten . In 1967 he took part in a production traineeship at the German TV broadcaster and from 1968 to 1973 he studied at the Potsdam University of Film and Television in Babelsberg , where he graduated with a degree in production / directing . He then worked as a freelancer for the DEFA studio for documentary films until 1983 .

In November 1976 he was one of the signatories of the petition against the expulsion of Wolf Biermann . To avoid the NVA military service , Günter Kotte spent a long time in 1977 in the psychiatric clinic St. Joseph, Berlin.

Rainer Simon hired him in 1978 as assistant director for the DEFA feature film Zünd, the fire brigade is coming . After studying with the writer Katja Lange-Müller in the Mongolian People's Republic in 1981, Günter Kotte applied for an exit visa and was able to move to West Berlin in 1983 . Here he worked as a dubbing director and freelance writer.

At the beginning of the 1990s, Günter Kotte took up residence again in the eastern part of Berlin and increasingly turned to documentary films and writing for radio features.

radio play

• Love life under the pseudonym André Negrit in co-authorship with Katja Lange-Müller (RIAS 1984)

Film and documentary

• Just a rehearsal , script / production management (HFF 1970)
• Rosenthaler Straße 51 , screenplay and direction (together with Heiner Sylvester ) (DEFA 1977)
• Ignite, the fire brigade is coming , assistant director, actor Geiger (DEFA feature film 1977/1978)
• I was someone too: Chef Hermann Reussner, born in 1891, tells from his life , screenplay (together with Werner Buhss ), (DEFA 1981/1982)
• The airship , starring sick , (DEFA film 1982/1983)
• Helga S. - From the life of a prostitute , screenplay and direction (MDR 1992)
• Dog Capital B. Screenplay and Director (MDR 1993)
• Djamilas Fenster - The stories of Tschingis Aitmatow , screenplay and direction (MDR / arte 1994)
• Normally I would never have met you - Carl Andrießen , screenplay and direction (1995)
• Die alten Frauen , screenplay and direction (SFB 1995/96)
• Clown of God - The Dancer Gregor Seyffert , screenplay and direction (1997)
• Dear Volodja - Vladimir Semjonowitsch Vysotsky , screenplay and director (SFB 1998)
• Lampion - c 'est si bon , screenplay and direction (SFB 2001)
• Oh 'Champs-Elysée… - The people of Hohenbüssow , screenplay and direction (2004)

Radio feature

• "Normally I would never have met you": The satirist and theater critic Carl Andrießen (DS-KULTUR 1992)
• Dear Volodja - Memory of the Soviet songwriter legend Vladimir Semjonowitsch Vysotsky (MDR 1998)
• "The other day they took my books away": The librarian Konrad Hawlitzki (MDR 1999)
• Russian Gold - From the Life of Vadim Ivanovich Tumanov (MDR 2000)
• I am no longer facing anyone - the writer Tschingis Aitmatow (MDR 2002)
• Strawalde or get on with your sinful life (MDR 2004)
• Of vodka pure soul (MDR 2005)
• From Napoleon's hat, the iron cross and links, two, three ... - From the life of the historian Klaus- Peter Merta (MDR 2006)
• I was once the ghost of Hamlet's father - Mrs. Bechstein , the Führer and Klaus Ebeling (MDR 2007)
• The steam pope and the black gang - steam tug 'Andreas' on a long journey (MDR 2007)
• Mister Elshamy - To Khartoum and back (MDR 2008)
• ... that my heart still speaks of black ink - Leonardi's inks are the best. The 'pelican' of the east (MDR 2008)
• Kalina Krassnaja - Roter Elderunder - Wassili Schukschin and his film (MDR 2009)
• The last sip - one way (MDR 2009)
• Faith that does nothing is damned chatter - Nikolaus Graf von Zinzendorf , A portrait of the founder of the Moravian Brethren (MDR 2010)
• Moscow-Petushki - The writer Wenedikt Erofejew (MDR 2010)
• Millions of small animals enjoy themselves not only in the meat grinder: Professor Axel Kramer (MDR 2011)
• A fine, quiet place: The Stadtgottesacker in Halle (MDR 2011)
• When time stands still or bored to actually fish? (MDR 2011)
• Johann Gottlieb Fichte . From Rammenau ... (MDR 2012)
• Stalin's voice - Yuri Borissowitsch Lewitan (DLR / MDR 2012)
• Without him, the powerful would often have been speechless: The interpreter Wolfgang Ghantus (MDR 2013)
• No, I'm not going away completely. Pushkin in Mikhailovskoye. (ORF 2013)
• It's not me, is it? A tribute to the cartoonist Henry Büttner (MDR 2013)
• The graves of the great Russians - The Novodewitschi Cemetery in Moscow (MDR / ORF 2014)
• When the hospital makes you sick (MDR 2014)
• Erika Hubalowski, Jonsdorf health resort , footwear (MDR 2014)
• Mustard in coffee - Senfmüller in Thuringia and Saxony (MDR 2015)
• The mummy from Red Square (MDR / SWR 2017)
• The surgeon from the Rhineland and his Lusatian children (MDR / WDR 2018)
• I like to smoke - Belormorkanal: What remains of the Stalin Canal (MDR / WDR 2019)

Audiobook publication

• Well Sdorovye. The Russians and their vodka. A story in songs and texts told by Günter Kotte, Ohreule, Eulenspiegelverlag 2007, ISBN 9783359010999

Web links

• Literature by and about Günter Kotte in the catalog of the German National Library
• Günter Kotte in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Portrait of Henry Büttner , feature by Günter Kotte, MDR KULTUR, audio
• Mustard in coffee , mustard millers in Thuringia and Saxony, essay by Günter Kotte, MDR KULTUR, audio
• The surgeon from the Rhineland and his Lusatian children , feature by Günter Kotte, MDR KULTUR, audio
• I like to smoke - Belomorkanal What was left of the Stalin Canal? Feature by Günter Kotte, MDR KULTUR / WDR5, audio

Individual evidence

1. ↑ DEFA Foundation ( Memento of the original from March 7, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
2. ↑ DIE ZEIT, December 3, 1976, No. 50
3. ^ Settlement with the Stasi regime . In: Der Spiegel . No. 13 , 1996, pp. 58-76 ( online ).
4. ↑ Ignite, the fire department is coming. Internet Movie Database , accessed June 10, 2015 . 
5. ↑ filmportal.de
6. ↑ FAZ January 16, 1998, p. 35
7. ↑ Filmlexikon Zweausendeins.de
8. ↑ Berliner Zeitung, October 19, 2001
9. ↑ Süddeutsche Zeitung, September 19, 2012, p. 31.
10. ↑ Freie Presse Chemnitz, November 12, 2013, p. 12
11. ↑ Günter Kotte: I like to smoke - Belomorkanal: What remained of the Stalin Canal. (pdf, 225 kB) In: SWR2 broadcast “Feature”. February 9, 2020, accessed on February 15, 2020 (also as mp3 audio , 47.8 MB, 53:37 minutes).