Oliver Polak in conversation with Patrick Lindner and Yasemin M’Barek: The ARD “Palace of Thoughts” convinces with diversity, sensitivity and seriousness.
Munich – The dark expanse between the trees of a forest at night, a horse, a cow, goats, rabbits, alpacas and a peacock: the comedian, author and Grimme Prize winner designed the intro in an unusual way for a show by Oliver Polak about his new talk format on Bavarian Radio. But anyone who thinks that the dancers in 1920s outfits and Polak’s silver cape are the end of the curious flagpole is wrong. And so, true to the motto “Thoughts are free”, Oliver Polak climbs up into the treetops of the forest like a blue phoenix at the end of the intro of his new show “Palace of Thoughts”.
Oliver Polak likes to play the role of the provocateur who wants to evoke people’s rejection through his actions. His performances are always shrill, loud and colourful. And at first glance, his new show seems to fulfill the usual characteristics of a “normal” Polak format, since part of the stage design is that the presenter and his guests are flanked by a screaming peacock throughout the recording.
New ARD talk show with Oliver Polak: Something is different in the “Palace of Thoughts”
But something is different – because the colorful and the shrill lose their provocative character in front of the unusual backdrop, because three people in the forest at night seem completely out of place anyway. But what the viewers are offered is not a jungle camp produced under public law. Due to the local setting, the “Palace of Thoughts” cleverly manages to fade almost every facet of socially constructed “normality”.
A space is created that cannot exist in this form in a television studio – regardless of whether it is set up on a high-rise roof or in a smoky basement bar. In the forest, detached from civilization, there is room for a conversation in which it is completely secondary that the host is wearing a monk’s habit, and a culture-critical conversation develops between Oliver Polak and his guests Patrick Lindner and Yasmine M’Barek, which apparently detached from any constricting, heteronormative convention works – a real palace of thoughts emerges.
To the broadcast
In the four other episodes, which are broadcast weekly on Thursdays at 11:15 p.m. on Bayrischer Rundfunk and are each published a week earlier in the ARD media library, Polak meets Frankfurt rapper Sabrina Setlur and trans rights activist Hana Coralles in the forest (3.3. im BR), to the linguist, author and rapper Reyhan Şahin (aka. Lady Bitch Ray aka. Dr. Bitch Ray) together with the federal spokeswoman for the Green Youth Sarah-Lee Heinrich (10.3.) and to the director and screenwriter Julia von Heinz (17.3.). For the fifth and final episode of the show, Polak invited the author of the book What White People Don’t Want to Hear About Racism, journalist Alice Hasters, and author Anna Dushime (March 24).
ARD talk show: The “Palace of Thoughts” with Oliver Polak works surprisingly well
An example of this is the first topic of the evening: “Cancel Culture”. Patrick Lindner reports in a very personal and approachable way about how he felt rejected by parts of his fan community and those around him after he came out. “You feel like you’re up against a wall and suddenly you have to justify something without even knowing why,” Lindner describes his situation. “Then you feel lost, in a deep valley, and lonely. That was a terrible feeling.” The audience can believe the pop singer, who celebrated his greatest successes in the 90s, without reservation.
In his role as moderator, Oliver Polak puts these personal descriptions into perspective with a view to the dominant society and, in this surprisingly serious conversation, repeatedly tries to unmask the absurdities of heteronormative reality, which he succeeds in gratifyingly well. The big age difference of around forty years between the two talk guests becomes fruitful here. Yasmine M’Barek adds the aspect of intersectionality to Lindner’s and Polak’s points and pleads for a well-founded activism that should not be expressed in wokem Cancel overzeal.
“Palace of Thoughts”: Brief change of topic in the ARD talk show with Oliver Polak
The talk briefly changes the topics, which are drawn by the participants in the group from a disco ball that seems to be floating down from the sky. Polak and his guests touch on topics such as linguistic socialization, insults and code switching, talk about dealing and the importance of money and about loneliness. The result is a conversation that impresses with its dynamism, sensitivity and diversity. When it comes to anger, on which Lindner, M’Barek and Polak shout together – not quite literally correctly – into the forest, the queer-feminist Female MC Finna resounds: “No sheet of paper, no document, determine my worth as a human being!”
After the first episode, this prospect of the coming guests clearly makes you want more. (Moritz Post)
Most recently, Oliver Polak roasted his guests on Netlix: In “Your Life is a Joke” Polak spends a day with his guests before making fun of them.
