''Eurocops'' is a European television crime TV-series produced between 1988 and 1992. It is a co-production between seven European TV stations in which each station produced a number of episodes which were then pooled, dubbed and otherwise adapted when needed and broadcast by all participating stations, a format used earlier in the German crime series

Tatort ''Tatort'' ("Crime scene") is a German language police procedural television series that has been running continuously since 1970 with some 30 feature-length episodes per year, which makes it the longest-running German TV drama. Developed by ...

. The participating networks were

ZDF ZDF (, short for Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen; ; "Second German Television") is a German public-service television broadcaster based in Mainz, Rhineland-Palatinate. It is run as an independent nonprofit institution, which was founded by all fe ...

from Germany,

ORF ORF or Orf may refer to: * Norfolk International Airport, IATA airport code ORF * Observer Research Foundation, an Indian research institute * One Race Films, a film production company founded by Vin Diesel * Open reading frame, a portion of the ...

from Austria, SRG from Switzerland, RAI from Italy,

Televisión Española Televisión Española (acronym TVE, branded tve, "Spanish Television") is Spain's national state-owned public television broadcaster and the oldest regular television service in the country. It was also the first regular television service in ...

from Spain,

Antenne 2 France 2 () is a French public national television channel. It is part of the state-owned France Télévisions group, along with France 3, France 4 and France 5. France Télévisions also participates in Arte and Euronews. Since 3:20 CET on 7 Ap ...

from France and

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...

from the United Kingdom. A direct consequence of the 'pooled production' format was that all episodes by one particular network had a strong local -even national- feel and were distinctly different from the episodes produced by other networks. Not only were they filmed in the network's own country with local actors, but they were also written by local screenwriters, thus reflecting that nation's specific taste for crime dramas. With national networks at that time still relying on self-produced programs, a big part of Eurocop's allure was that it offered viewers in one country a first-hand look at what crime series in other countries looked like. Despite being a pan-European TV series, the three German speaking networks did more than half of the filming with Germany and Austria filming 15 episodes on their own and one more joint production. Switzerland contributed another 12. Of the four non-German speaking countries, Italy made 13 episodes and France made 8, whereas Spain and the UK made only 4 and 3 episodes respectively. All in all, in a span of five and a half years, seventy-one episodes were produced. Typically they were broadcast once a month. In Germany, ZDF broadcast the series on every fourth Friday as part of its Friday night crime lineup. (The three other Fridays it would broadcast episodes from other homemade crime series). Its first broadcast was on November 6, 1988 with a Swiss production called "Tote reisen nicht" (English: The dead don't travel).

Introduction and title music

A little sensation for its time was the title sequence. Not only was the title music a haunting electronic theme composed by

Jan Hammer Jan Hammer () (born 17 April 1948) is a Czech-American musician, composer, and record producer. He first gained his most visible audience while playing keyboards with the Mahavishnu Orchestra during the early 1970s, as well as his film scores fo ...

(Playing Piano's, Synthesizers & Gretch Drums), it was accompanied by a wild camera ride in which a camera circles over a map of Europe, shows the different cities in which the episodes play and for each city shows a picture of the local detective with his name and title. Finally the camera zooms out into a picture of the police badge of the country in which the episode in question plays. Still a novelty for this time, the title was completely computer generated.

Cast and crew

Germany

*''Produced by:'' Monaco Film, Munich for

*''Directors:'' Georg Althammer, Werner Kließ *''cast:'' **

Heiner Lauterbach Heiner Lauterbach (; born 10 April 1953) is a German actor. Life and work Heiner Lauterbach was married to German actress Katja Flint who is the mother of his son Oscar (*1988). Later he had a relationship with Jenny Elvers. Since 7 Septemb ...

as Thomas Dorn **

Eva Kryll Eva or EVA may refer to: * Eva (name), a feminine given name Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional characters * Eva (Dynamite Entertainment), a comic book character by Dynamite Entertainment * Eva (''Devil May Cry''), Dante's mother in t ...

as Karin * ''City:''

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western States of Germany, state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 m ...

Austria

*''Produced by:''

*''Directors:'' Rud'i Nemeth, Peter Müller *''cast:'' **

Bernd Jeschek Bernd is a Low German short form of the given name Bernhard (English Bernard). List of persons with given name Bernd The following people share the name Bernd. *Bernd Brückler (born 1981), Austrian hockey player *Bernd Eichinger (1949–2011), G ...

as Peter 'Bernd' Brucker **

Bigi Fischer Bigi may refer to: Surname * Emilio Bigi (1910–1969), Paraguayan singer * Federica Bigi, Sammarinese diplomat and politician * Ikaros Bigi (born 1947), German theoretical physicist * Luca Bigi (born 1991), Italian rugby union player Other uses * ...

as Bigi Herzog **Hermann Schmid as Oberinspektor Nurmeier * ''City:''

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

Switzerland

*''Produced by:'' SRG *''cast:'' **

Alexander Radszun Alexander Radszun (born 6 May 1952) is a German actor. He appeared in more than ninety films since 1975. Selected filmography References External links * * 1952 births Living people German male film actors German male television ...

as Christian Merian **

Wolfram Berger Wolfram Berger (born 12 October 1945 in Graz) is an Austrian actor. Selected filmography * ''Assassination in Davos'' (1975) * ''General Sutter ''General Sutter'' is a 1999 Swiss historical film directed by Benny Fasnacht and starring Wer ...

as Peter Brodbeck * ''City:''

Basel , french: link=no, Bâlois(e), it, Basilese , neighboring_municipalities= Allschwil (BL), Hégenheim (FR-68), Binningen (BL), Birsfelden (BL), Bottmingen (BL), Huningue (FR-68), Münchenstein (BL), Muttenz (BL), Reinach (BL), Riehen (BS ...

Italy

*''Produced by:'' RAI2 *''Music by:'' Stefano Mainetti (9 episodes) *''cast:'' ** Diego Abatantuono as Commissario Bruno Corso **

Bruno Pagni Bruno may refer to: People and fictional characters *Bruno (name), including lists of people and fictional characters with either the given name or surname * Bruno, Duke of Saxony (died 880) * Bruno the Great (925–965), Archbishop of Cologne, ...

as Marco

France

*''Produced by:'' France 2 *''cast:'' **

Patrick Raynal Patrick may refer to: * Patrick (given name), list of people and fictional characters with this name *Patrick (surname), list of people with this name People * Saint Patrick (c. 385–c. 461), Christian saint *Gilla Pátraic (died 1084), Patrick ...

as Commissaire Nicolas Villars ** Bertrand Lacy as Commissaire Luc Rousseau **

Étienne Chicot Étienne Chicot (5 May 1949 – 7 August 2018) was a French actor and composer.François Perrot François Perrot (26 February 1924 – 20 January 2019)Marseille Marseille ( , , ; also spelled in English as Marseilles; oc, Marselha ) is the prefecture of the French department of Bouches-du-Rhône and capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Situated in the camargue region of southern Franc ...

Spain

*''Produced by:''

Velarde Films Velarde may refer to: *Velarde, New Mexico * Velarde CF, Spanish football team * Velarde map, a 1734 map of the Philippine People * Carlos Velarde (born 1990), Mexican boxer * Efraín Velarde (born 1986), Mexican football player *Enrique Gorostiet ...

for

*''cast:'' **

Álvaro de Luna Álvaro de Luna y Fernández de Jarava (between 1388 and 13902 June 1453), was a Castilian statesman, favourite of John II of Castile. He served as Constable of Castile and as Grand Master of the Order of Santiago. He earned great influence in t ...

as Subcomisario Andrés Crespo

United Kingdom

*''Produced by:''

Picture Palace Productions An image is a visual representation of something. It can be two-dimensional, three-dimensional, or somehow otherwise feed into the visual system to convey information. An image can be an artifact, such as a photograph or other two-dimensiona ...

for

*''Director:'' Malcom Craddock *''cast:'' **

John Benfield Jonathan Edmund Fulford "John" Turner (9 November 1951 – 16 June 2020), better known by his stage name John Benfield, was a British character actor. Biography Benfield appeared in 75 television episodes or films starting in 1981 with small pa ...

as Detective Constable George Jackson ** Linda Henry as Linda Jackson ** Jonathan Phillips as Stonehead ** David Bradley as Roper

External links

*
EUROCOPS

BFI The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves film-making and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery to encourage film production, ...

* http://krimiserien.heimat.eu/e/eurocops.htm * https://web.archive.org/web/20120530132040/http://www.tvsi.de/krimiserien/eurocops.php
odeonfilm.de
Folgen der Monaco Film (heute Odeon-Film) {{Authority control 1988 German television series debuts 1993 German television series endings Fictional police officers ZDF original programming German crime television series 1980s German police procedural television series 1990s German police procedural television series

Introduction and title music

Cast and crew

Germany

Austria

Switzerland

Italy

France

Spain

United Kingdom

See also

External links