Producer award for Christian Popp (Producers at work Film) at the 30th Filmfest Hamburg

from left to right:
Alexander Thies, Jana Schiedek, Christian Popp, Albert Wiederspiel

Christian Popp wins this year’s Hamburg Producer Award for German Television Productions with the ARD Degeto event production “The Miracle of Cape Town” starring Sonja Gerhardt and Alexander Scheer.

Inspired by true events, Franziska Buch directed the historical drama about the world’s first heart transplant on a human being, based on the screenplay by Christoph Silber. Das Erste and ARD Mediathek will broadcast the film at the end of the year.

The jury justifies the award as follows: “In our eyes, the production company Producers at Work has succeeded in combining a world-historical event with the theme of women’s struggle for professional recognition in an exciting and entertaining way. The race for the first heart transplant, which is told on film for the first time in The Miracle of Cape Town, also provides an opportunity to remember apartheid through a true black key figure.”

TV Film, 105 min, South Africa, Czech Republic, Das Erste 2022

Premiere “30th Hamburg Film Fest”, official selection “Televisionen//FF2022”
Screening 4th of October 2022

from left to right:
Christoph Silber, Patrick Noel Simon, Arnd Klawitter, Clara Wolfram, Christian Popp

In 1967, the world’s first human heart transplant was performed in South Africa. An operation that not only revolutionized the medical world. Inspired by this true incident, Sonja Gerhardt plays Lisa Scheel, a budding Frankfurt doctor who works hard to become one of the first women to succeed in male-dominated surgery. Nevertheless, Prof. Kohlfeld (Fritz Karl) prefers her to a male applicant. Deeply hurt, Lisa pursues her plan and travels to Cape Town to join Kohlfeld’s rival, Dr. Barnard (Alexander Scheer), who is also feverishly working on the first heart transplant. After an uphill battle, Lisa joins Barnard’s surgical team, where she experiences firsthand the injustice of apartheid. Together with Hamilton Naki (Loyiso MacDonald), who can only participate in the operation in secret due to his dark skin color, Lisa plays a major role in making the first heart transplant a breakthrough in medicine.

Cast
Sonja Gerhardt, Alexander Scheer, Fritz Karl, Loyiso MacDonald, Clara Wolfram, Thimo Meitner, Arnd Klawitter u.a.

Crew
Directed by: Franziska Buch
Written by: Christoph Silber
DOP: Bella Halben
Music: Martina Eisenreich
Producer: Christian Popp, Tobias Stille