In a new interview, Günther Klum talks about his time with “GNTM”, about his daughter Heidi Klum and alleged gag contracts.
While Heidi Klum (49) presents himself in front of the camera as the face of “Germany’s next top model”, her father Günther Klum (77) worked behind the scenes of the show for many years. He had already negotiated the first contract with the ProSieben broadcaster in 2005 – at a time when it was not yet clear whether the concept of the talent show would be successful.
If the show had been canceled after three years, “this would have been okay for us financially,” explains Klum. He founded the agency OneEinsFab, where models from the show received contracts. In the past few years, there had been repeated media reports that these were supposed to have been gag contracts. Sometimes severe criticism from former participants made the rounds again and again.
It’s all about “business, business, business”?
Most recently, Tessa Bergmeier (33) spoke about her experiences with “GNTM” in the RTL jungle camp. She was made “a monster” in the format, according to her, the model mom was “ice cold” and the 49-year-old didn’t care about the candidates. it .
All of this was also noticed by Günther Klum, who described Bergmeier as “ungrateful” in the interview. You know the 33-year-old “if at all, only because of ‘Germany’s next top model’. And then years later she blasphemes about us there.”
“But what is said there is nonsense,” continues Günther Klum. According to him, the ProSieben format took good care of the young models. But his daughter has four children, “after a long day of shooting she’ll go home at some point”. Over 15 seasons, Klum’s father “intercepted a lot. I was always the bad cop, Heidi the good cop. That’s okay, I can do a lot. Then I just played the bogeyman, who was said to only do the gag contracts anyway .”
Günther Klum: Contracts were “customary in the industry”
According to Klum, however, it was never a matter of gag contracts, they were “customary in the industry”. “In general, it’s all so inflated: we always made more money with the show than with the girls’ agency commission. OneOne was just a side income.” Nobody complained about the contracts either, as was sometimes written. Every model who arrived with a lawyer was immediately told “Bye!” said. “Some girls have told hair-raising stories that you should actually take legal action against,” explains Klum.
Günther Klum also responds to rumors of alleged disputes between him and his daughter. “There’s nothing to reconcile,” he says. He did not attend the wedding of Heidi and Tokio Hotel guitarist Tom Kaulitz (33) in 2019 for health reasons. Although an operation on his broken knee took less than an hour until everything had healed, nine months had passed. There are still days when he walks “like a duck”: “I hadn’t been told that before. That’s why I wasn’t at the wedding.”
New “GNTM” season will start shortly
He doesn’t like the recent development of the show, says Günther Klum. For him, “GNTM” was always “the least trashy” of all the casting formats: “I prevented the trash at the time.” If you want to see for yourself how trashy the show really is, you can watch it shortly. The new episodes will be available from February 16th. ProSieben shows the episodes of the now 18th season every Thursday from 8:15 p.m.
Source: Stern
I am an author and journalist who has worked in the entertainment industry for over a decade. I currently work as a news editor at a major news website, and my focus is on covering the latest trends in entertainment. I also write occasional pieces for other outlets, and have authored two books about the entertainment industry.
