Drei, Zwei, Eins, Action!

German Language Living Community Soap Opera, Episode 3: “Vanessa’s Visit”

Plot Summary (Voice Over):
Hans is a German exchange student who lives in Wells Hall. He has a girlfriend, Vanessa, back in Germany but he is falling in love with another girl, Elizabeth, who is American. She also lives in Wells. Hans and Elizabeth finally started dating on last week's Valentine's Day episode. This week, we’ll find out what happens when Vanessa travels from Germany to visit Hans, her boyfriend—as far as she knows…
Scene 1
(Four girls are exercising in a gym)
ALL: “Eins, Zwei, Drei, Vier…”

The average Miami student may take a break from his or her busy day by settling in front of the television to watch the similarly dramatic plot line of their favorite midday soap opera. This is not so for the 12 students who reside in the German Language Living Learning Community. They’re too busy creating their own brand of drama.

While the concept may seem fundamental, the challenge lies in conducting the entire process—writing, directing and acting—in German. As the latest project of the German language learning living community, the participating Wells Hall students are finding out just how fun and interactive language learning can be.

The production of a German language soap opera is yet another opportunity for students to take their education beyond the classroom. Every Thursday night, the students, mostly first-years and sophomores of all different majors, and their hall’s program director, Przemek Tokarski, and director assistant Ivett Perlaki, meet in the lobby of Wells for some laughter and creative flexibility.

As Tokarski, a visiting instructor, manages a large, white drawing board—very much like the kind used in the television show version of Pictionary—students shout out the most dramatic and scandalous plot concepts that they can think of, ranging from love triangles to bulimia. Some are realistic, some are a little outrageous, but it is clear that the participants are entertained, just as they hope their audience would be.

“The more controversial, the better,” says Chris Burton, a sophomore zoology major who plays Hans.

Erin Munsie, a sophomore German education major, agrees.

“When are we doing the kiss between two men?” she asks jokingly. “Come on. I want to be opening doors. I want to be a progressive show. I want to win an Emmy!”

With immense energy and imagination, subplots are developed and details of the characters’ pasts are established. Initial conversation usually begins in English, as students pour their ideas out faster than they can translate. Tokarski and Perlaki manage to slow them down enough to translate the dialogue into German. In approximately one hour, the group composes a working script for the week’s episode.

The students are expected to learn their lines within the week so that on following Thursday, they can begin filming. The filming process includes a run-through of each scene to make some last-minute revisions and to practice pronunciation. Depending on what is called for in the script, the lobby of Wells is transformed into a working film set, anything from a café to a gym. In the event of a much-needed location change, the crew will travel down the road to film on location at McDonald’s (to film a group lunch) or Kroger (to film a Sunday grocery shopping trip), making the plot both believable and relatable to the everyday life of a Miami student.

Once the scenes have been filmed and edited by Tokarski and Perlaki, the five to ten minute episode is posted on the floor’s website at for all to enjoy.

The concept of the soap opera was originally proposed Tokarski, who developed the concept with Robert DiDonato, chair of the department of German, Russian and East Asian Languages (GREAL). Together, they discussed the potential models for program including Lindenstrasse, a soap opera that has run on German television for about 17 years. In addition, DiDonato was able to lend his first-hand experience with the soap opera genre. He serves as a chief academic and series developer for Fokus Deutsch, a German instructional series of interviews, documentary footage and mini-dramas that cover real-life topics such as school and personal relationships.

DiDonato stresses the importance of the department’s use of performance—using language not only in “real world” situations but creatively, as well. He applies this sense of performance to the hall, in general.

“The floor is so valuable to us because we are limited to just 50 minutes in the classroom,” said DiDonato. “[Students] can extend the amount of practice time they have with the language through the activities of the floor.”

First-year student, Valerie Milton, who plays Elizabeth, finds the experience both fun and beneficial.

“The soap opera is such a creative idea,” Milton says. “It enhances our learning experience because we have to think outside the box, as well as in German.”

Munsie finds that the experience especially helps her conversational German.“Any chance to use a foreign language is beneficial,” Muncie says. “Since we’re filming a soap opera, it is really helping me use more idiomatic phrases so I don’t sound like a textbook or a dictionary when I speak German.”

Junior anthropology major Alyce Bachem doesn’t even live in the hall anymore but she comes to Wells every Thursday to play the role of Vanessa. A resident of the German language hall as a first-year student, Bachem got wind of the soap opera project because she was still on the hall’s e-mail list.

“The soap opera sounded fun so I just started showing up,” says Bachem.

Along with the soap opera, the German language living floor conducts a number of one-time and ongoing activities outside of the classroom—enough to fill Tokarski’s three-inch thick binder devoted to the hall. Such activities include a German magazine, produced by the residents once a semester; film series like “Berlin Metamorphosis,” a two-evening showing of movies depicting Berlin before and after WWII; and a weekly Wednesday night dinner at Hamilton Hall where the residents and directors eat and converse in German. All hall activities are optional and supplemental to “Modern German Film: A Window on German Culture,” a course taught by Tokarski. Hall residents are required to take the course as first-year students. During the class, students view German films with English subtitles and participate in a discussion about each viewing.

Tokarski is in his fourth year as hall director and also resides in the hall, as does Perlaki who is in her second year as director assistant. Tokarski believes the living learning community serves as an excellent means of learning about German culture.

“At least for the first two years, if you start from scratch, you are mostly learning the language—reading, writing, and listening,” says Tokarski. “But from the course, activities and speakers, you learn the German life. You cannot have this is the classroom. It is connected with practicing the language and it should be fun.”
The sounds of laughter that fill the Wells Hall lobby/gym/café every Thursday night suggests that it certainly is.

Closing Teaser (Voice Over):
Find out what happens next week when Vanessa and Elizabeth meet for the first time and Vanessa, on her visit to America, discovers that she coincidentally shares a common ex-boyfriend with Anne-Marie—the same boyfriend that caused her bulimia!

*Episodes of the German Language Living Learning Community soap opera are available for viewing on the German Language Living Learning Community Web site