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Pitfalls of Comedy in Germany

Comedian in Trouble for Eating Sausage at Wheel in TV Show

Being a comedian in Germany can be hard at times. Comedy star Hape Kerkeling has received a legal complaint from a television viewer for eating a sausage while driving in his new show, in which he plays a taxi driver.

A German comedian who plays a taxi driver in a candid camera show has received a legal complaint from a viewer who spotted him committing two minor traffic violations on television.

In his show "Hallo Taxi," Hape Kerkeling, 43, a gifted impersonator, has amusing conversations with passengers which are recorded by a hidden camera. One viewer seemed to be paying more attention to his driving than the comic aspect of the show.

"In the episode on April 19 he was seen eating a curry sausage while driving one-handed and in the episode on April 26 he was speaking to taxi headquarters on his mobile phone while driving," a spokesman for the public prosecutor's office in Düsseldorf, western Germany, told SPIEGEL ONLINE.

"We received a request from a viewer asking us to launch an investigation for possible traffic violations. We will not be launching an investigation because the offences are too long ago and have lapsed."

Kerkeling also apparently was drinking from a hipflask during the show.

The complaint has only just now been made public. Officials were originally confused as the viewer made the legal complaint against Kerkeling's taxi-driving character Günter Warnke rather than the comedian himself.

Kerkeling is well-known in Germany for his spoof shows and once famously talked his way to the German president’s palace pretending to be the queen of Holland.

Even if Kerkeling were to have been fined for his traffic violations, he would have had no trouble affording it because he has recently enjoyed spectacular success as an author. His diary-style account of how he made a pilgrimage on the Way of St. James across northern Spain in search of God has sold more than 3 million copies, making it the best-selling German non-fiction book since World War II.

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