Hape Kerkeling starts as an influencer: “Otto talked me in”

The popular social media channel Instagram has had one more German comedian among its users for almost a week. At the age of 60, Hape Kerkeling has now found his way onto the visual platform. But this didn’t happen on his own initiative.

In his usual humorous manner, he opens his account with a short video. The few posts he published in the first week already earned the actor over 300,000 followers. A new and contemporary way to give your fans a dose of Kerkeling humor here and there: “Dear friends, for Christmas I’m giving you this, my first and only official Insta channel! Have fun, your Hape,” he wrote in addition.

A gift for which Kerkeling fans should rather thank his comedian colleague Otto Waalkes. At the “Kölner Treff” on WDR, Hape Kerkeling talked about how he came to his late career as an influencer.

“Otto talked me into it.” About a month ago, Kerkeling met with 76-year-old Otto Waalkes, who explained to him: “I saw that you don’t have Instagram at all. I have that too, you have to do that.” At first Kerkeling was skeptical about the idea. “I told him: ‘No, Otto. I don’t know anything about it and I can’t set it up either.'”

But that wasn’t a counterargument for Waalkes; Waalkes, 16 years his senior, quickly took over setting up the account, Kerkeling tells moderator Susan Link. And he was also given an assignment to maintain the new account: “Now I have to post funny Advent videos every three days.”

Apparently Otto Waalkes has a high level of persuasiveness, because in May 2024 Hape Kerkeling said: He had already “tried out” social media, but that’s not my world,” in an interview with “Bild am Sonntag”. And what is his conclusion after about a week of being an influencer? “Exhausting, but people are watching.”