Peter Mühlen

You will be the first to learn of my passing.

E-Book: 4,99 €

On 1 August 2012, an interview with Peter Mühlen was planned at his home in Haar near Munich, which he shared with his partner, Sissy Engl. In the end it became a conversation that unfolded differently than agreed: after a severe crisis the night before, Mühlen asked his partner to answer in his place at first—“Sissy knows so much about me she could write a book about me!”—and gave her a photo album that we were to go through together. Only after hours did he join us himself and open tersely: “Ask any questions you like, and I’ll try to answer them.”

Because a serious illness had taken his voice a few months earlier, Mühlen wrote his answers on slips of paper. He handed me lines that suggested his despair, along with a written CV, a list of works, and permission to photograph his meticulously kept photo collection—documents of a person who recorded his life as if trying to wrest it from oblivion.

In German radio history, his name is inextricably linked with the “Plattenkiste”: “Peter Mühlen’s Plattenkiste,” broadcast weekly on Bayerischer Rundfunk from 1962 to 1966, shaped listening habits and for many provided a first systematic introduction to popular music. But Mühlen was far more than a presenter: he wrote scripts for radio, television, and theatre; co-initiated the rediscovery of Korngold’s opera “Die tote Stadt”; worked as a disc jockey, actor, dubbing artist, director, composer, critic, and showmaster; appeared in more than 200 theatre productions; and in 1984 co-founded and served as managing music editor of one of Bavaria’s first private radio stations. Together with Sissy Engl he also founded an academy where he taught phonetics and acting—until the illness silenced his voice in March 2012.

This interview brings together his written answers—and paints the portrait of a multitalented man who struggled for expression to the very end.

The book cover shows a facsimile of his farewell letter, which he wrote in the night before the interview for Heinz Michael Vilsmeier.

Translation of the cover text, letter dated 31 July 2012

Dear Mr. Vilsmeier,

Enclosed is a CV, already somewhat battered.

You will be the first to hear of my passing!

You are welcome to inform the press!

Sissy knows so much about me that she could write a book about me.

Photo material in the „record cabinet“

Mountains of it and the album to go with it.

Good luck,

I greet you as a stranger

Peter Mühlen

P.S. Forgive me if Vilsmaier (?) is spelled differently !

Sample reading

The following excerpt comes from the full interview that was published in the publication.

Peter Mühlen writes: My mother was a single parent and overwhelmed. I was the youngest of seven children by three different fathers. It was a “women’s household,” and everyone took it out on the “little one”—until her death. Sometimes, when I was ten, she beat me for trivial reasons, e.g., a tear in my trousers, with a “Spanish cane” so badly that for weeks I couldn’t sit. Enough! As a child of the Second World War, I was completely bombed out twice; two half-brothers were killed in Russia in 1943 and 1944. I could go on, but if you know John Steinbeck’s “East of Eden”—in the film with James Dean and Raymond Massey—then that isn’t necessary.

HMV: You say your mother was overwhelmed. She was an actress, and you couldn’t spend your whole childhood with her.

Peter Mühlen writes: My mother was a popular actress; back then people said popular singer or comic. Altogether she put me into a “home” three times: once in Munich, once in Grunertshofen near Augsburg, and once at the Karlshof estate in Ismaning. …

HMV: …were these church-run homes where you were placed?

Peter Mühlen writes: One was church-run—Grunertshofen—and it was Catholic.

HMV: You suffered greatly from being sent away to homes again and again. How were you able to cope with these traumatic experiences in such a way that you could develop your talents and build this career?

Peter Mühlen writes: In spite of everything, I would have preferred to be at home, because I was attached—needy for love. As in the film “East of Eden,” my drive was to find love and recognition. And because everyone was artistically active: my mother briefly acted once with Karl Valentin, supposedly because Liesl Karlstadt was ill (?). My mother was not a star, not famous, even though a postcard with her picture hangs in the Valentin Museum. My father would have been well-off, a descendant of the Asam brothers. But I saw him only once in my life; I was about two years old.

HMV: Did you miss your father a lot as a child?

Peter Mühlen writes: Yes.

HMV: In the book “Personalities in Munich” there is the following entry: Mühlen, Peter: actor, music editor and presenter, born 4 October 1939 in Munich. I believe you were born in 1933: is the birth date 4 October 1939 correct?

Peter Mühlen writes: My date of birth is 4 October 1933—that has been a secret until today. But in my current condition, I couldn’t care less!

HMV: Why did you change your date of birth?

Peter Mühlen writes: Why change it? I always looked younger. Out of pure vanity I “made myself younger”!