As BKA case analyst Gloria Acheampong, Thelma Buabeng is investigating in North Frisia. In the dpa interview, the actress recognizes parallels between her character and herself.
ZDF is launching a new crime thriller from the far north. Afro-German actress Thelma Buabeng (“Night Shift”) plays a case analyst named Gloria Acheampong. Their first case on Monday (September 30th) at 8:15 p.m. took place in North Frisia and revolved around violence against women. Several victims have disappeared without a trace.
Rudi Butscher (Burgtheater star Nicholas Ofczarek) was legally convicted of at least two proven murders – even though he protests his innocence. And then another murder happens. The body of a prostitute from Ghana is pulled out of the water near a bridge. Killed apparently in the same pattern as Butscher’s victims. He cannot be the perpetrator, as he is in solitary confinement in Lübeck prison. “The Policewoman and the Language of Death” was directed by crime expert Lars Becker (“Night Shift”).
Clever investigator with warmth and humor
Gloria Acheampong, self-confident special investigator and case analyst from the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) in Kiel, has a degree from Stanford University. She also asserted herself in the police force as a single mother and Afro-German woman. Acheampong also comes from Ghana.
The forty-something woman confidently takes charge of her investigations at the Danish border, working collegially with village police officers like Pieper Olsen (Artjom Gilz, “The Whistleblower”). With her own ingenuity, she soon realizes that this time it is by no means the same pattern of murder – after all, the victim was not raped.
The title heroine Acheampong is one of the few black investigators on primetime television in Germany – after Florence Kasumba’s “Tatort” detective Anais Schmitz, who worked alongside Maria Furtwängler alias Charlotte Lindholm in Göttingen from 2019 to 2024 (ARD). Buabeng, who was born in Ghana and lives in Berlin, has created an extremely likeable character in her “policewoman”. Despite all her cleverness, the investigator impresses with her calmness, warmth and humor.
In the past she often played as a slave or cleaning lady
“At the point when we get to know her, she is sure of her job and her abilities,” explains the actress (43) in the dpa interview. And adds: “She simply tries to approach her tasks with great confidence. And that’s a bit of me too.”
Her path as an artist was also fraught with many hurdles, says Buabeng, who came to Germany with her family in 1984 and grew up in the Rhineland. “Many people told me that it wouldn’t work, that you wouldn’t make it in Germany as a black actress. In fact, I used to be used primarily as a slave, servant and cleaning lady. But I never gave up.”
TV educational use for integration
How did the film project even come about? “I’ve already filmed with Lars a few times – for example in his ZDF crime series “Nachtschicht”. And we both wanted to do something together again.” The author and director Becker wrote the script especially for her, says Buabeng, who has also celebrated success in the theater and as a comedienne, and is still noticeably pleased.
As a black investigator in the province, where other people with a migrant background also live, her Acheampong doesn’t have it easy. She is outright rejected by xenophobic locals. “The BKA should send someone else,” mayor Johnny Schippers (Michael Lott) grumbles to Pieper. Last but not least, it is his son Kevin (Enno Trebs) who is in trouble.
The atmospherically strong film, for which, according to ZDF, a follow-up story is already being planned if the ratings are right, has a strong educational side. Director Becker (70) says: “Breaking the stereotypical and prejudiced narratives means not only showing the social reality as a country of immigration where many have made it, but – in a visionary way – where this question no longer arises.”
In this socio-political context, the leading actress of the dpa says: “I wish that everything would become a little more normal. That there would be more diversity on television that reflects our society. Because we migrants haven’t just been here since yesterday.”
film