Willem Theodoor "Wim T." Schippers (; born 1 July 1942) is a Dutch artist, comedian, television director, and voice actor. During the 1960s, he worked mostly as a visual artist, associated with the international
Fluxus
Fluxus was an international, interdisciplinary community of artists, composers, designers and poets during the 1960s and 1970s who engaged in experimental art performances which emphasized the artistic process over the finished product. Fluxus ...
-movement. As a television writer, director, and actor he is responsible for some of the most notable and controversial shows on Dutch televisions from the 1960s to the 1990s, creating a number of lasting characters and enriching the language with terms and expressions first coined in his shows. In addition, he voiced the characters of
Ernie and
Kermit the Frog on ''
Sesamstraat
''Sesamstraat'' () is a Dutch television series in the Netherlands, and a spin-off of the U.S. children's program ''Sesame Street''. In its early days the show was broadcast in Flanders (Belgium) as well. It is the second longest-running foreign ...
'', the Dutch version of ''
Sesame Street
''Sesame Street'' is an American educational children's television series that combines live-action, sketch comedy, animation and puppetry. It is produced by Sesame Workshop (known as the Children's Television Workshop until June 2000) a ...
''. For his shows, he has written over three hundred songs, and his reputation has changed from being Dutch television's "''enfant terrible''" to an acknowledged master in a variety of genres.
Biography
Early career: visual arts
Schippers, born in
Groningen
Groningen (; gos, Grunn or ) is the capital city and main municipality of Groningen province in the Netherlands. The ''capital of the north'', Groningen is the largest place as well as the economic and cultural centre of the northern part of t ...
, grew up in
Bussum and studied at the ''Kunstnijverheidsschool'' (later the
Gerrit Rietveld Academie
The Gerrit Rietveld Academie, also known as Rietveld School of Art & Design and Rietveld Academy, is an art academy in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The academy was founded in 1924 and offers programs in fine arts and design.
History
In 1924, the I ...
) in Amsterdam but did not graduate. He began a career as a visual artist in the early 1960s, influenced by
dada and artists as
Marcel Duchamp
Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...
and
Kurt Schwitters
Kurt Hermann Eduard Karl Julius Schwitters (20 June 1887 – 8 January 1948) was a German artist who was born in Hanover, Germany.
Schwitters worked in several genres and media, including dadaism, constructivism, surrealism, poetry, sound, pain ...
,
participating in a number of
Fluxus
Fluxus was an international, interdisciplinary community of artists, composers, designers and poets during the 1960s and 1970s who engaged in experimental art performances which emphasized the artistic process over the finished product. Fluxus ...
events,
such as a section for the television program ''Signalement'' in 1963, in which he poured a bottle of lemonade in the
North Sea
The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Norway, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. An epeiric sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the Norwegian S ...
.
Willem Sandberg invited him and
Ger van Elk
Ger van Elk (9 March 1941 – 17 August 2014) was a Dutch artist who created sculptures, painted photographs, installations and film. His work has been described as being both conceptual art and arte povera. Between 1959 and 1988 he lived and wo ...
to exhibit in
Museum Fodor; among other things, they covered one floor with broken glass and one with kitchen salt. With
Willem de Ridder and others he manufactured paper installations on the
VARA
Vara or VARA may refer to:
Geography
*Vara (river), in Liguria, Italy
*Vara Parish, former municipality in Tartu County, Estonia
* Vara, Estonia, village in Peipsiääre Parish, Tartu County, Estonia
*Vara Municipality, municipality in western Swe ...
television show ''Signalement'' that was ridiculed in the press in December 1963, and published a full-page enumeration of types of meat balls in 1965 in ''
Vrij Nederland'', already displaying his love for
absurdist humor
Surreal humour (also called surreal comedy, absurdist humour, or absurdist comedy) is a form of humour predicated on deliberate violations of causal reasoning, thus producing events and behaviours that are obviously illogical. Portrayals of surrea ...
and language games that marked his later career.
His first stint in television gained him notoriety along with the rest of the crew of the
VPRO television show ''
Hoepla'' (1967) when actress
Phil Bloom became the first woman to appear nude on television. That show was quickly canceled, and Schippers returned to visual arts.
Throughout the 1960s Schippers' work was popular with the director of the
Stedelijk Museum
The Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (; Municipal Museum Amsterdam), colloquially known as the Stedelijk, is a museum for modern art, contemporary art, and design located in Amsterdam, Netherlands. in Amsterdam, Willem Sandberg, who bought many of his drawings and collages. Sandberg's successor, , did invite Schippers for a solo show, but did not consider him a serious enough artist.
A notable work was the ''
Pindakaasvloer'' ("Peanut butter platform"), a floor covered with
peanut butter
Peanut butter is a food paste or spread made from ground, dry-roasted peanuts. It commonly contains additional ingredients that modify the taste or texture, such as salt, sweeteners, or emulsifiers. Peanut butter is consumed in many countri ...
. The concept dated from 1962, but it was first realized in 1969 in Loenersloot. The work was redone in 1997 in the
Centraal Museum in Utrecht, and again in a gallery in 2010.
Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen
Municipal Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen () is an art museum in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. The name of the museum is derived from the two most important collectors of Frans Jacob Otto Boijmans and Daniël George van Beuningen. It is located at ...
in
Rotterdam
Rotterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Rotte'') is the second largest city and municipality in the Netherlands. It is in the province of South Holland, part of the North Sea mouth of the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta, via the ''"N ...
bought the concept in 2010 and installed it in 2011; at least three visitors accidentally walked onto the 4 by 12-meter floor, and Schippers fielded more than 500 video questions on the blog ''Pindakaaspost''.
Radio and television
Schippers returned to VPRO television in 1971, writing ''
De Fred Haché Show'', with The Hague comedian
Harry Touw as the character Fred Haché, directed by Schippers and
Ruud van Hemert
Ruud van Hemert (29 October 1938 – 5 July 2012) was a Dutch film director known especially for (dark) comedy. In the 1970s he helped produce and direct TV shows on VPRO before starting a career as a film director.
Biography
Ruud van Heme ...
,
Gied Jaspars
Gied Jaspars (6 July 1939 – 14 February 1996) was a Dutch television maker who gained prominence in the 1960s and 1970s making progressive and controversial TV shows for the VPRO; he is well known for his collaboration with writer and dire ...
, and
Wim van der Linden
Wim van der Linden (1 January 1941, Amsterdam – 4 April 2001, Miami) was a Dutch photographer and film and television director. As a photographer he documented slums and subcultures in Amsterdam in the 1960s. His "Tulips", one of four experiment ...
. His girlfriend
Ellen Jens
Ellen Jens is a Dutch television director and producer, best known for her collaboration with Wim T. Schippers on VPRO television. She has produced and directed a large number of other television shows, especially on literature and art, and is ref ...
produced the show, and worked with Schippers throughout his television career. Subsequently, he wrote ''
Barend is weer bezig
''Barend is weer bezig'' (''Barend Does it Again'') was a Dutch television show written and directed by Wim T. Schippers with Wim van der Linden, Gied Jaspars, and Ruud van Hemert and broadcast by the VPRO in 1972-1973. The show was produced by El ...
'' (which ran for five episodes) for the ''Hachéshow''s character Barend Servet (played by
IJf Blokker
IJf Blokker (born 2 September 1930) is a Dutch musician and television actor and presenter. After a professional career as a drummer, he became a well-known television actor in the 1970s playing the character Barend Servet in the Wim T. Schippers-d ...
). The two shows were closely related (Schippers also designed the sets for both), and featured absurdist comedy which included the kinds of low-brow content not allowed to be seen or heard on Dutch television— dog poop, nudity, profanity. Controversy arose over a skit in which Barend Servet interviewed
Juliana of the Netherlands
Juliana (; Juliana Louise Emma Marie Wilhelmina; 30 April 1909 – 20 March 2004) was Queen of the Netherlands from 1948 until her abdication in 1980.
Juliana was the only child of Queen Wilhelmina and Prince Henry of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. Sh ...
(played by "Ria"); the queen drank sherry and cleaned Brussels sprouts to pretend to feel close to the Dutch people, before throwing them in the trash or donating them to a children's home. The show led to questions being asked in parliament about the depiction of her majesty, and the VPRO was censured by the minister of culture, narrowly escaping having its broadcasting hours cut.
For another character from the two shows,
Sjef van Oekel (played by
Dolf Brouwers), Schippers wrote ''
Van Oekel's Discohoek
''Van Oekel's Discohoek'' was a Dutch television show, aired on VPRO in 1974-1975. The show, written by Wim T. Schippers and produced by Ellen Jens, starred Dolf Brouwers as the comedic character Sjef van Oekel, and parodied music television progr ...
'' (1974). It was a breakthrough for Brouwers (already 61 at the time), a former tour guide and hairdresser who had always aspired to becoming a star. Brouwers scored a few minor hits with songs from the show, and later became the main character in a series of comics by
Theo van den Boogaard
Theo van den Boogaard (born 25 March 1948, Castricum, Netherlands) – also known as Theo Bogart – is a Dutch cartoonist. He first came to attention as an underground cartoonist in the early 1970s for the sexually explicit comics series ''Ans ...
. Brouwers was also the lead in the 1978 television show ''
Het is weer zo laat!
''Het is weer zo laat!'' ("It's that time again!"), also known as ''Waldolala'', is a Dutch television show from 1978, written and directed by Wim T. Schippers and co-produced by Schippers, Gied Jaspars, Wim van der Linden en Ellen Jens. It was t ...
'', in which he played Waldo van Dungen, a part-time waiter in a night club who becomes its owner after a rich woman (Gé Braadslee, played by
Mimi Kok) falls in love with him and buys the club for him. The show also included characters that would return in later shows, such as Boy Bensdorp (
Rob van Houten
Rob or ROB may refer to:
Places
* Rob, Velike Lašče, a settlement in Slovenia
* Roberts International Airport (IATA code ROB), in Monrovia, Liberia
People
* Rob (given name), a given name or nickname, e.g., for Robert(o), Robin/Robyn
* Rob (s ...
) and Jan Vos (
Clous van Mechelen
Clous van Mechelen (born Jacob Philip (Jack) van Mechelen; 12 March 1941 in Amsterdam) is a Dutch musician, arranger, and actor. Van Mechelen scored a minor hit in 1969 with his band The Butlers, and became widely known through the radio and telev ...
). The night club, "Waldolala", provided Schippers the opportunity for more chaotic scenes, controversial nudity, and
double entendre
A double entendre (plural double entendres) is a figure of speech or a particular way of wording that is devised to have a double meaning, of which one is typically obvious, whereas the other often conveys a message that would be too socially ...
s.
In the 1980s, Schippers wrote, directed, and acted in the VPRO shows ''
De lachende scheerkwast
''De lachende scheerkwast'' ("The laughing shave brush") is a Dutch television show written and directed by Wim T. Schippers, who also plays one of the lead characters, Jacques Plafond. It ran on VPRO television for six episodes in 1981 before bei ...
'', ''
Opzoek naar Yolanda
''Opzoek naar Yolanda'' was a Dutch dramady television show by Wim T. Schippers, consisting of six episodes aired by the VPRO from October to December 1984. The show (a parody of sitcoms and soap operas, like most of Schippers' shows) was a cont ...
'', and ''
We zijn weer thuis
''We zijn weer thuis'' (''Back home again'') is a Dutch dramady-series broadcast by VPRO from 1989 to 1994. It was written by Wim T. Schippers and co-directed with Ellen Jens as his swansong-series for VPRO. The series was released on dvd in Oct ...
''. From 1984 to 1991 he had a radio show, ''
Ronflonflon ''Ronflonflon'', or ''Ronflonflon avec Jacques Plafond'' ("Ronflonflon with Jacques Plafond"), was a radio show on the Dutch broadcaster VPRO. It was produced and directed by Wim T. Schippers who also played the principal character and radio host, J ...
met Jacques Plafond''. By the 1990s his early shows were collected by museums as video art,
he had been awarded many times, winning the Lira award for television drama, and had graduated from being the "''enfant terrible''" of Dutch television to "an appreciated master in various genres". Many of the word jokes and catch phrases from his television and radio shows have found their way into the Dutch language—examples cited are "Jammer maar helaas" ("Pity, but unfortunate", Jacques Plafond), "Reeds!" ("Already!", Sjef van Oekel), "Pollens!" (untranslatable, Plafond), "Peu nerveu" (verbatim from French, "a bit nervous", Plafond), "Verdomd interessant, maar gaat u verder" ("that's damn interesting, but please continue", Plafond).
Of all Dutch artists, in terms of contributions to the language he is only preceded by
Marten Toonder
Marten Toonder (2 May 1912 – 27 July 2005) was a Dutch comic strip creator, born in Rotterdam. He was probably the most successful comic artist in the Netherlands and had a great influence on the Dutch language by introducing new words and expr ...
,
Kees van Kooten
Cornelis Reinier "Kees" van Kooten () (born 10 August 1941) is a Dutch comedian, television actor, and writer. He formed the duo Van Kooten & De Bie with Wim de Bie from 1972 to 1998.
Biography
Cornelis Reinier van Kooten was born on 10 Augus ...
, and
Wim de Bie
Willem Philippe "Wim" de Bie (; born 17 May 1939) is a Dutch comedian, writer and singer. He formed the comedy duo Van Kooten en De Bie with Kees van Kooten. G.J. van Bork,Bie, Wim de, ''Schrijvers en dichters'', 2002. Retrieved on 17 December ...
, according to the book ''Verdomd Interessant, Maar Gaat U Verder: De Taal van Wim T. Schippers'' (2000). In addition, he estimates having written over three hundred songs for his television shows.
Plays
Schippers made three television plays for the VPRO, ' (1976), ''
Sans rancune'' (1987), and ''
De bruine jurk'' (1988). In 1986 he drew international attention as theater director with ''
Going to the Dogs'', a 46-minute play that premiered in the
Stadsschouwburg
The Stadsschouwburg (; Dutch: ''Municipal Theatre'') of Amsterdam is the name of a theatre building at the Leidseplein in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The building is in the neo-Renaissance style dating back to 1894, and is the former home of the Na ...
in Amsterdam and featured six
Alsatian dog
The German Shepherd or Alsatian is a German breed of working dog of medium to large size. The breed was developed by Max von Stephanitz using various traditional German herding dogs from 1899.
It was originally bred as a herding dog, for he ...
s reading newspapers, watching TV, barking at the screen when they saw another dog on it, and occasionally relieving themselves. The drama on stage continued the absurdity of his television work,
but the real play, according to Schippers, was the audience watching dogs on a stage.
Since ''Going to the Dogs'' he has periodically returned to the stage, with ''Wuivend graan'' (2007)
[ (nominated for the Toneel Publieksprijs, an audience award),] ''Wat nu weer'' (2009), and most recently '' Het laatste nippertje'' (2011).
Voice work
Schippers has voice-acted Ernie, Kermit the Frog, Guy Smiley
Guy Smiley is a fictional character on ''Sesame Street'' who was dubbed "America's favorite game show host". His skits are among those on the show that parody commercial media. Smiley has also hosted ''This Is Your Lunch'' and ''Here Is Your Lif ...
, and Count Von Count
Count von Count (known simply as the Count) is a Muppet character on the PBS/HBO children's television show ''Sesame Street.'' He is meant to parody Bela Lugosi's portrayal of Count Dracula. He first appeared on the show in the Season 4 premiere ...
on ''Sesamstraat
''Sesamstraat'' () is a Dutch television series in the Netherlands, and a spin-off of the U.S. children's program ''Sesame Street''. In its early days the show was broadcast in Flanders (Belgium) as well. It is the second longest-running foreign ...
'', the Dutch co-production of ''Sesame Street
''Sesame Street'' is an American educational children's television series that combines live-action, sketch comedy, animation and puppetry. It is produced by Sesame Workshop (known as the Children's Television Workshop until June 2000) a ...
'', ever since its first season in 1976. With Paul Haenen, who does the voice of Bert
Bert or BERT may refer to:
Persons, characters, or animals known as Bert
*Bert (name), commonly an abbreviated forename and sometimes a surname
*Bert, a character in the poem "Bert the Wombat" by The Wiggles; from their 1992 album Here Comes a Son ...
, he wrote and recorded a slew of Bert and Ernie albums.
He is also the voice of Happy in Disney
The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...
's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
"Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" is a 19th-century German fairy tale that is today known widely across the Western world. The Brothers Grimm published it in 1812 in the first edition of their collection ''Grimms' Fairy Tales'' and numbered as Ta ...
in the Dutch dub from 1984.
Visual arts
After de Wilde, director of the Stedelijk Museum, turned Schippers down, he returned only intermittently to the visual arts. He had an exposition of prints in the Stedelijk in 1970, accompanied by a rather puzzling text in the program, after which the relationship between him and the museum remained strained. Notable (and monumental) art projects of his include '' Torentje van Drienerlo'' (1979), in which the top of a tower rises above an artificial lake, suggesting the rest is underwater, and the "marriage room" in the Amsterdam Stopera (1988). Schippers' art work is praised for its sense of humor; when a dozen journalists stood pensively around the peanut butter platform, Schippers cried out, "Isn't this fantastic! We're all watching peanut butter!"
For his combined achievements in painting and writing, he was awarded the Jacobus van Looy prize
A Jacobus is an English gold coin of the reign of James I, worth 25 shillings. The name of the coin comes from the Latin inscription surrounding the King's head on the obverse of the coin, IACOBUS D G MAG BRIT FRA ET HI REX ("James, by the grace o ...
in 2005.
Works
Television shows
*'' Hoepla'' (VPRO, four episodes, 1967)
*'' De Fred Haché Show'' (VPRO, 1971)
*''Barend is weer bezig
''Barend is weer bezig'' (''Barend Does it Again'') was a Dutch television show written and directed by Wim T. Schippers with Wim van der Linden, Gied Jaspars, and Ruud van Hemert and broadcast by the VPRO in 1972-1973. The show was produced by El ...
'' (VPRO, 1972–1973)
*''Van Oekel's Discohoek
''Van Oekel's Discohoek'' was a Dutch television show, aired on VPRO in 1974-1975. The show, written by Wim T. Schippers and produced by Ellen Jens, starred Dolf Brouwers as the comedic character Sjef van Oekel, and parodied music television progr ...
'' (VPRO, 12 episodes, 1974)
*''Het is weer zo laat!
''Het is weer zo laat!'' ("It's that time again!"), also known as ''Waldolala'', is a Dutch television show from 1978, written and directed by Wim T. Schippers and co-produced by Schippers, Gied Jaspars, Wim van der Linden en Ellen Jens. It was t ...
'' (VPRO, 10 episodes, 1978)
*''De lachende scheerkwast
''De lachende scheerkwast'' ("The laughing shave brush") is a Dutch television show written and directed by Wim T. Schippers, who also plays one of the lead characters, Jacques Plafond. It ran on VPRO television for six episodes in 1981 before bei ...
'' (VPRO, 12 episodes, 1981–1982)
*''Opzoek naar Yolanda
''Opzoek naar Yolanda'' was a Dutch dramady television show by Wim T. Schippers, consisting of six episodes aired by the VPRO from October to December 1984. The show (a parody of sitcoms and soap operas, like most of Schippers' shows) was a cont ...
'' (VPRO, 6 episodes, 1984)
*'' Plafond over de vloer'' (VPRO, 9 episodes, 1986)
*''We zijn weer thuis
''We zijn weer thuis'' (''Back home again'') is a Dutch dramady-series broadcast by VPRO from 1989 to 1994. It was written by Wim T. Schippers and co-directed with Ellen Jens as his swansong-series for VPRO. The series was released on dvd in Oct ...
'' (VPRO, 47 episodes, 1989–1994)
Drama
*'' Going to the Dogs'' (1986)
*''Wuivend graan'' (2007)[
*''Wat nu weer'' (2009)]
*'' Het laatste nippertje'' (2011)
Television plays
*' (VPRO, 1976)
*'' Sans rancune'' (VPRO, 1987)
*'' De bruine jurk'' (VPRO, 1988)
Albums
*''Hark!'' 1980, Jacques Plafond & his Plafonnières
*''Geen Touw'' (1990, compilation of ''Ronflonflon'' songs)
*''Schippers in Plafondvaart'' (1992, compilation of ''Ronflonflon'' songs)
References
External links
*
Wim T. Schippers at Arttube (Museum Boijmans)
''Barend is weer bezig''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Schippers, Wim T.
Dutch contemporary artists
1942 births
Living people
Dutch comics writers
Dutch male dramatists and playwrights
Dutch humorists
Dutch male stage actors
Dutch male television actors
Dutch male voice actors
Dutch satirists
Dutch surrealist artists
Dutch surrealist writers
Dutch television directors
Dutch television presenters
Dutch television writers
Male television writers
Fluxus
Surreal comedy
Gerrit Rietveld Academie alumni
People from Groningen (city)
20th-century Dutch comedians
21st-century Dutch comedians
20th-century Dutch male actors
21st-century Dutch male actors
20th-century Dutch male artists
21st-century Dutch male artists
20th-century Dutch male writers
21st-century Dutch male writers
20th-century Dutch dramatists and playwrights
21st-century Dutch dramatists and playwrights