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The eternal “Tatort” commissioner: Miroslav Nemec turns 70
Miroslav Nemec was in his role as a crime scene inspector for 35 years – now the actor turns 70. Photo
© Tobias Hase/dpa
As a civil servant, you normally retire in your mid-60s, maybe even earlier. But Miroslav Nemec is still a “Tatort” detective at 70 – at least for a while.
It was a major turning point for the German crime drama. When the Bavarian Broadcasting Corporation announced in January that the Munich “When “Tatort” detectives Miroslav Nemec and Udo Wachtveitl called it quits with the cult series after 100 episodes, many described this step as what it is: the end of an era.
Nemec and Wachtveitl then spent 35 years in their roles as Ivo Batic and Franz Leitmayr, and anyone who wonders how closely intertwined the two are with their roles in the public perception should take a look at Nemec’s books, which he brought onto the market a few years ago.
“The Dead from the Falkneralm” and “Croatian Roulette” are the names of his crime novels, in which he himself is the main character: Nemec, who becomes an investigator because everyone knows him as a “Tatort” detective and thinks he is one.
Five episodes still missing
On June 26, Nemec will turn 70. “The crime scene commissioner and I” is the name of the edition of “Lebenslinien” that Bayerischer Rundfunk released in 2019, for Nemec’s 65th birthday, and which is now being broadcast again to mark his milestone birthday.
While other officers of that age have long since retired, he still has a lot ahead of him. 95 episodes with the Munich investigative team have been shown on ARD so far – there are still five to go until the 100th.
“As ‘Tatort’ chief inspectors, Udo and I have seen off some real police colleagues and a Munich police chief in retirement in recent years. They were all a bit younger than us,” said Nemec when BR announced that he and Wachtveitl were now slowly but surely saying goodbye. “We are also not Keith Richards and Mick Jagger, who still have to work at 80,” Wachtveitl said at the time.
The story of Nemec and Wachtveitl as Batic and Leitmayr goes back to 1991, making them older than the 1993-born actor Ferdinand Hofer, who has played the assistant Kalli for more than ten years. Only Ulrike Folkerts as Ludwigshafen investigator Lena Odenthal has been in service for two years longer – but has had significantly fewer cases during that time.
From “Born to be wild” to “Rebel yell”
Dozens of cases surrounding “Love, Sex and Death” (1997), “Strong Beer” (1999), the “Viktualienmarkt” (2000) and “The Last Oktoberfest” (2015) followed the first case of the Nemec/Wachtveitl team entitled “Animals”.
It is unlikely that he will not know what to do with his time after his “Tatort” exit next year. Because “Tatort” and acting are by no means everything for Nemec, who was born in Zagreb in 1954 and was sent by his parents from what was then Yugoslavia to Freilassing in Bavaria at the age of twelve.
As a teenager he dreamed of becoming a rock musician and today he is a fairly successful musician. In 1996 he founded the Miro Nemec Band, which sings cover songs from “Born to be wild” to “Tausendmal Berührungen” to “Rebel yell”.
Information about the lifelines