The new ORF series starts at 8:15 p.m. on ORF 1 and from 10:00 a.m. on ORF ON and in the TVthek app
Vienna (OTS) – There is still peaceful silence in the corridors – but that will change suddenly from January 22nd, 2024 on the ORF 1 series Monday at 8:15 p.m. and from 10:00 a.m. on ORF ON and in the TVthek app, when the first TV year moves into the “School of Champions”! Ten young talents then have to give everything to fulfill their big dream at the elite ski boarding school in the mountains of Austria, between the pressure to succeed, the training plan and growing up. In the eight-part ORF series, filmed between October 2022 and March 2023 in the Gastein Valley and Vienna, drama and action are guaranteed against a natural backdrop as the high-performance athletes fight their way to the top – and pay a high price for it.
For this new TV series, produced by ORF, BR and SRF, a team of popular TV faces as well as newcomers stood in front of the camera – including Jakob Seeböck, Josephine Ehlert, Gregor Seberg, Simon Hatzl, Thomas Mraz, Ferdinand Hofer, Judith Altenberger, Sonja Romei, Ferdinand Seebacher, Emilia Warenski, Imre Lichtenberger, Luna Mwezi, Mikka Forcher, Moritz Uhl and Anna Thunhart. Anna Veith and Thomas Morgenstern make cameo appearances. Dominik Hartl and Johanna Moder directed a TV series for the first time. Samuel Schultschik was responsible for the scripts. “School of Champions” is a production by Superfilm in co-production with Catpics for ORF, BR and SRF with support from Fernsehenfonds Austria and the state of Salzburg. Preparations for the next ski season are already underway: filming for the second season of “School of Champions” began at the end of November. There is even more serial entertainment when we see “Quickly Investigated” again at 10 p.m., when Ursula Strauss has to immerse herself in the world of it girls and boys in order to solve a death in the Lainzer Tiergarten.
Jakob Seeböck: “Look for things in roles that are also in me”
“My role is called Mark Auer. He is the director of the Gastein Ski Academy and a former ski racer, has won an Olympic bronze medal and one or two World Cup victories – but that’s about it. What really annoys him is when he is called the Olympic champion of hearts. He is faced with problems from politics, to sports, to his son Nikki’s puberty and even to his ex-wife.” And further: “When it comes to roles, I look for things that are also within me. And with a 14-year-old son that I have in my private life and a 15-year-old in the series, I didn’t have to look far for problems or differences in communication between adults and children. Working with the boys and girls was just great. They were all very professional and it worked great.”
Emilia Warenski: “It helped that I am a competitive athlete myself”
“It is a highlight for me to be able to stand here. It was crazy from the first casting – from lots of cool scenes and days of shooting to the dinners.” She says about preparing for her role as Daniela Strobl: “What definitely helped me is that I’m a competitive athlete myself. From climbing I have the determination and ambition that you need anywhere in competitive sports. This is a feeling you have in every competition or skiing in every race. I also talked a lot with people who worked in skiing, read a lot, watched a lot and worked out scenes.”
Imre Lichtenberger: “Nikki is much more impulsive than me”
Imre Lichtenberger says about his “School of Champions” character Nikki Auer: “I like my role. We are not 100 percent the same, but we are similar in a few ways. Nikki is much more impulsive than me, but he has a good moral compass.” His favorite scenes are “the diving scene – we simulate diving training and shot the underwater scene together with an expert. And the scene in which I give Josephine Ehlert, aka head coach Franziska Hubert, a pep talk about her training methods. I thought that was very cool.”
“School of Champions” is a production by Superfilm in co-production with Catpics for ORF, BR and SRF, made with the support of TV Fund Austria and the State of Salzburg.
Further information about the series is available at presse.ORF.at.