Tourism boost expected on back of German TV drama
Hundreds of tourists are expected to flock to Cork and Kerry this summer after 7.7 million people in Germany watched a television drama shot in the southern counties.
Judith von Rauchhaupt, from Tourism Ireland’s German office, said industry chiefs were expecting the numbers of those visiting the locations shown in ‘An Ocean Apart’ by Robin Pilcher to soar.
“Around 26,000 people logged onto our home page on the internet the next day after the programme was broadcast,” she said. “That means people went to their PC and actually looked for Ireland.”
More than 7.7 million people in Germany watched the drama, An Ocean Apart, when it aired on the ZDF German state television stations on Sunday, January 8 last.
The television drama, An Ocean Apart, was shot in Cork and Kerry in several locations including Bantry House, Dunboy Castle, Kenmare and Cork City between August 25 and September 23 last year.
The movie was based on a novel by Robin Pilcher, son of the novelist Rosamunde, and was a follow-on film to one of Germany’s most successful and popular series, the Rosamunde Pilcher films. The Rosamunde Pilcher films generally attracted between six to eight million viewers when screened.
“They are planning two more dramas. Most likely they will be filmed in Ireland this year,” she said, adding the choice of Ireland as a location was a coup as previously the Pilcher stories always took place in Cornwall or Scotland.
Ms von Rauchhaupt said the previous Rosamund Pilcher movies were credited with bringing thousands of German tourists to Britain.
“For a lot of Germans these films were actually the reason to visit Great Britain and we are hopeful that ‘An Ocean Apart’ will have a similarly positive effect on tourism business from Germany to the Cork-Kerry region and beyond,” she said.
“We see the benefit with regard to the dramas they focus on the landscape it is not just telly drama.”
Tourism Ireland said one of the biggest tour operators in Germany, Der Tour, organise trips on the Pilcher programmes.
Ms von Rauchhaupt said the Der Tour catalogue included a Robin Pilcher tour in Ireland highlighting all the locations shown in the programme including Kenmare and Bantry House, which she hoped would encourage hundreds of people to travel.
She said both Tourism Ireland and the Irish Film Board aided the German producers in choosing sites to film in and in basing the production crew in Kenmare, Co Kerry.
Around 35 film crew and 15 actors were based in the town throughout the shoot.
Ms von Rauchhaupt said the budget of €1.3m ensured the production was a major boost to the economy during the five-week shoot.
She said the next two dramas to be filmed may be based in other areas around Ireland, such as Connemara.
