Griet Op de Beeck is the new presenter of Zomergasten: ‘I’m going to try to sit there as myself’

Yes, Griet Op de Beeck did make a dance in the room when she heard that she was the TV program this year Summer Casters was allowed to present: « It feels like Sinterklaas times twenty -seven. » The 51-year-old Flemish writer, known from Bestsellers as Many heavenly above the seventh and Come here that I kiss youtalks about her new job in her guest house in Baarn: « Summer Casters Has such a track record – a program in which you can really talk without having to be over after one minute. I have deep admiration before that is still possible now, it is more important than ever. And then that rich tradition of fantastic presenters who preceded me. To be able to contribute to that, is an honor. « 

The three-hour interview program has been around since 1988 and has been built around the favorite film and TV fragments of the guests. Summer Casters is recovering from a mantled 38th season. Last year, presenter Theo Maassen had to give way after allegations of domestic violence. When the intended replacement Adriaan van Dis also failed to fail due to health, Omroep VPRO had a problem. Eventually she asked six former presenters to perceive an episode. One of them, Margriet van der Linden, received the Sonja Barend Award for her raid.

Op de Beeck first made a test broadcast at the VPRO with someone who had previously been Zomergast. « They had an exercise – I am not allowed to say who was – far beyond my interest atmosphere. So I thought: that never will be fine. But I found her very interesting. Nice to notice that my deep curiosity in the human being that I thought could have been stretching to this extreme anyway. »

No, she is not going to mirror herself to glorious predecessors such as Adriaan van Dis (1999-2002) or Janine Abbring (2019-2022). « I’m going to try to sit there as myself. Then I have the best chance of a real meeting between me and that guest. » What she looks forward to is that she can not only get to know the « personal worlds of special guests », « but also the worlds in which they are, what they are passionate about, and the vision they have from there in the world. »

This is her first job as a TV presenter. Not unique, Summer Casters was previously led by people without experience as a presenter, such as Joris Luyendijk (2006-2007) and Joost Zwagerman (2003-2004). Op de Beeck has experience as a journalist. Before she focused on the literature in 2013, she worked for the Flemish magazine Humo and the daily newspaper The morning. « For Humo I also made interviews of two or three hours. But that is a big difference with TV interviews. Suppose I will be particularly boring for the next twenty minutes, then you can decide as a writing interviewer: Let go, I will cut it out later. ” That is not possible on television: « Then you have to keep an eye on the clock and talk from fragment to fragment. »

Writer in the dark

Does it help to be a writer? « Yes, I think writers are always looking for what drives people and how far away from their past are a good position to be of service to the guest. Although I am present with my own curiosities and ideas, it is about the guest. And the more it differs from who I am, the more fascinating it becomes. »

Does she like to start the conversation uninhibited or would she prefer to work from a scenario? « I like to start well prepared for the meeting. As a result, I will hopefully know in advance what I want to know and what the relevance is of the fragments we show. But from that preparation I am open to surprises. When the guest comes with a ready -made story, I will try to create side roads » in this case that she gets a « Dm » and all the dm guest  » Watches and programs, from which the excerpts are picked.

Become a therapist

Three years ago Op de Beeck made a remarkable career switch: She became a therapist. Does that new profession provide a good basis for the interviews in Summer Casters? « Maybe I see a bit interesting to go deeper faster. And that I can seduce people faster to look at things with another lens. But an interview is something other than a session. It’s not the intention that Summer Casters Only about dark soul stirrers. The viewer also wants to learn something and hear a surprising vision of the world. Summer Casters Is a place par excellence where guests can explain their ideas at rest. « 

Why did she become a therapist? « Well, I could also have written Griet Op de Beeck’s eighth novel. But I wanted to take a step so that I could be of more meaning for people. Of course I heard from readers of: » That book touched me deeply « or » That book turned on me to start the conversation with my father.  » But that is something different than actually putting people on a good track. « 

Following her third novel The best we have She told them in the talk show in 2017 De Wereld Draait Door That she was abused by her father as a small child. This discovery was the start of a long search for salvation. Op de Beeck had a great success as a writer before, but she lived in deep darkness, as long as she could remember. « I was looking at my own success with stupid surprise. I could never think for a moment: well, apparently I did something good. I thought it was strange that people wanted to read my books in large numbers. I thought: they are quite against but that is because they don’t know who I really am. »

When Op de Beeck was still in the dark, she was a guest herself in Summer Castersin 2016 with presenter Thomas Erdbrink. « I could not believe that I was allowed to come then. That someone wanted to talk to me for three hours out of genuine interest. » At that time she did not yet know what was going on with her. How did she experience that evening? « I don’t know exactly what I said anymore. But I was honest about the fact that I certainly didn’t think it was a picnic to be here. However, I have always had a kind of persistence, a kind of eagerness in me. I always wanted to live in full. And I kept looking for ways in which that might have been possible. And that was also dark that I was sincerely. Share a large audience.

Saved

Thanks to sessions with IFS therapists, Op de Beeck found redemption. She recorded her search and what the method contains It gets better. IFS (Internal Families Systems) assumes that people are made up of a collection of wounded and protective parts (personalities) and investigates how the core (the self) gets a better connection with those parts. IFS is not recognized by official psychology but has pulled out of her all -dominating trauma on the Beeck.

She says: “In one important session there is really something in me tilted in which I am suicidality and eating disorder in one fell swoop. If I wake up now, I feel like the day and I find myself a pleasant person to be up to. There is a kind of deep peace that cannot be disturbed so quickly. I didn’t know that you have to exist. flow on.  » Op den Beeck does not want to give the impression that IFS is a « quick fix » « but it is a beautiful form that has given me and many others a different life. »

When Op de Beeck opened her own therapy practice, she received more than two thousand registrations “that are enough patients to far after my death. I especially want to introduce as many people as possible to IFS by explaining the method in groups. For example through introduction weeks. Ifs is not a storytelling, huh how to do your life-moving. Doing yourself.

Yes, she knows it is « a national sport » to kick the presenter of Summer Casters. How will she deal with that later? « I like to listen to criticism from the editors or from friends but I am not going to google myself, that never done that. If Herman Brusselmans used to write in a columns that I had a mustache, I started studying my upper lip in front of the mirror. Big ass, big breasts, small breasts – I have had it all more. I can no longer have my existence, but nowadays I can do it. prove.

Summer Casters (VPRO) can be seen from Sunday 27 July. NPO2, 8.15 pm. The broadcaster will announce who the guests of this year are this year.

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