Werner-Drafner Rötger Feldmann becomes 75

Born on March 17, 1950 in Travemünde, Feldmann began to draw as a child. “In winter there was nothing going on in Travemünde, sometimes a car or a fish cutter, the Swedish ferries,” said Feldmann in 2020 in an interview with the magazine “Spiegel”. “I held that.” He also read comics, often for hours, and at some point began to draw small stories.

Caricatures of the boss ended his apprenticeship

When Feldmann was seven years old, the family moved to Flensburg on the German-Danish border 160 kilometers away because the father went to the Federal Navy. After school, Feldmann made an apprenticeship as a lithograph, but soon lost the subsequent job because he drew caricatures from his boss during work.

Then Feldmann was unemployed for a few years, lived from “support” and screwed in his workshop on his Horex motorcycle. He constantly campaigned with the police, TÜV and registration office. And because it could happen that the components of his machine fell off or “crumbled down”, he got the nickname crumbs at that time.

At the end of the 1970s, Brösel drew the first “Werner” comic history for a magazine, in 1981 appeared with “Werner – or what?” The first comic band. The North German rocker slang and the mixture of lovable clumsy and rebellion against the authorities hit a nerve: the first 10,000 copies were sold out after a few months. 16 more volumes should follow.

The model for Werner’s experiences as an installation teaching was the stories of Brother Brother Andi Feldmann. “I have always told him stories by Meister Röhrich, where I learned as a heating installer,” said the brother in November 2024 in an interview with the daily newspaper “TAZ”. “Then he mapped it on Werner.”

Sentences like “Is this need that this is so over oxidized here?” The always cigar -smoke and economy boss with the high voice is still cited again and again.

In 1990 Werner came to German cinemas with “Werner – Beinhart”, produced by Bernd Eichinger. Although the mix of real and animation sequences also met with criticism, the film attracted five million people to cinemas. Further films followed in 1996 (“Werner – that has to boil !!!”), 1999 (“Werner – full Rooäää !!!”), 2003 (“Werner – will be done later!”) And 2011 (“Werner – ice cold!”).

Feldmann, who lives with his wife in the country between Kiel and Neumünster, began to revise and relocate all of his comic volumes with his wife between Kiel and Neumünster.

The whole bureaucracy and the madness of the world stimulate it as ever. Brösel processes a lot of it in stories. There is no trace of retirement with the artist. “I work every day,” says Rötger Feldmann in an interview with the German press agency. There are currently several projects on his desk near Kiel.

Feldmann has always processed part of his own life story in his 13 “Werner” main books and other books. “There is a lot in the books that we went through at the time. Some things are overwhelmed, but also understood, ”says Brösel. He came up with some things.

The journey to the south with an oldsmobile bought for 4000 marks in Hamburg, on the other hand, really existed, including the inflatable boat on the roof and king, says Brösel. “Highly comfortable a rolling kingdom. On the way back we burst the head poetry because we were too stupid to fill in water. ”

Water and colon

Brigade leaders are the screws on the machines, the struggle with the authorities and plenty of colonizers (“Hau Wech the shit”). The 13th “Werner” main band “Wat nu!?” is from 2018. A 14th over the snotty plumber apprentice should come. Five movies over the anti-hero attracted millions of people to cinemas. They continue on television.

At 75, Brösel attaches great importance to conscious nutrition and health theory of Ayurveda. “I drink a lot of water. Man should consume two and a half to four liters, you can’t drink that in beer. You’re stupid after a week. ” He visited a nutritionist with his wife. “Because every body needs different gasoline,” says Brösel.

“It’s going too well,” says wife Petra about her husband. She takes care of the organizational, keeps the whole bureaucracy off his neck. “She leads the company and does everything,” he says. For more than 30 years, the couple has lived largely in a listed manor in a small village south of Kiel.

When Brösel draws, his eyes begin to shine. His works are still being created with pencil. He has been revising his old works for years, currently Volume 12 is “Free Railway with Marzipan !!!” from 2004 to work. He likes the new drawings better than the old ones. “The Werner always looks a bit as if he has just eaten something,” says Feldmann. That makes him so personable.

A good 20 years later, he also revised the volume in terms of content. 40 pages are added. “Back then I was in a bad mood and the stories weren’t that great.” In one of the new stories, his Petra also plays as a reporter. He didn’t ask her before.

“Some things are now embarrassing to me,” says Brösel. Some things from the old comics are no longer up to date, other things can draw better today. “I also learn from others.” The stories for comics were on the street: “You just need to go out and watch some people,” says Brösel.

“In the past, Rötger quickly hit his nail on the head, he was able to represent the expression of a person,” says Petra Feldmann. Her husband can still do that, but now he has the claim to be perfect. “It takes longer and he creates less.”

For Prime Minister Daniel Günther (CDU), Brösel is a real Schleswig-Holstein original. The draftsman had created an absolute cult figure with “Werner”. “In my youth I liked to read the Werner comics and also saw the films in the cinema.” He had already talked to Feldmann and his wife about how things will continue with his work in the future. “After all, his comics, films and figures are a piece of real Schleswig-Holstein cultural history.”

Bröels motorcycles such as the famous “Red-Porsche-Killer”, with which he lost the legendary “Werner” race in Hartenholm in 1988 in front of an estimated 250,000 spectators and won the revenge against his buddy Holger Henze in 2018, are in the converted cowshed. None is registered.

“I just don’t have a nerve because my machines are so converted,” says the draftsman. “I am busy with my books, I can no longer stand in the workshop.” In addition, something can be done on the farm.

The last kick for Wacken

The two founders and organizers of the Heavy Metal Festival in Wacken, Holger Hübner and Thomas Jensen, also visited the 1988 race in Hartenholm. “The Wacken Festival idea was created in the Landgasthof, but the Werner race was already the last kick that moved us to do a festival and announced this in the Landgasthof in Wacken in 1989,” says Hübner.

Of course, Brösel is looking forward to the relegation in the Bundesliga. But he rarely goes to the stadium. He follows the storks’s games on television. The draftsman enjoys meeting fans, says Brösel. “But when I go to the stadium in the afternoon, I just have to drink beer all the time and write autographs. Then I’m dead in the evening. “

Some of Bröels expressed their way into the vocabulary of many Germans over the years, such as “Tass Kaff”, “Flasch beer” or “giant giant” – if a screw cannot be loosened. So Rötger Feldmann – even if Werner’s great time is over – left lasting traces.