The football pro turned theatre star

bundesliga.com: Jimmy, your career as a actor has now lasted longer than your time in professional football. How did you find your way into theatre and film?

Jimmy Hartwig: "I already had some contacts in TV, but my theatre work began totally by coincidence. At the start of the 2000s, I was doing an interview in legendary Berlin restaurant Ciao Ciao, near the Schaubühne theatre. All of a sudden, a famous German actor, Thomas Thieme, came to our table and spoke to me. Even though he's from East Germany, he's a Hamburg fan, and about six months later he called me."

bundesliga.com: To talk about HSV?

Hartwig: "No, he wanted to know whether I could imagine taking on a role in a Bertolt Brecht play."

bundesliga.com: What was your response?

Hartwig: "I asked him, 'Where did he play?' [laughing]. In all honesty, my knowledge of German theatre was lacking at the time, so I needed to do some studying first before committing to anything."

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bundesliga.com: Your acting debut eventually came in 2002, at the National German Theatre in Weimar.

Hartwig: "Yes, I played 'Businessman Mäch' in Brecht's 'Baal'. Three years later, I played 'Herzog Suffolk' in Thieme's 'Margaretha. Eddy. Dirty Rich.'"

bundesliga.com: How did you manage to become such a good actor?

Hartwig: "I had an excellent teacher in Thomas Thieme, who I think is the best German actor. He taught me all about little subtleties. Similar to a football coach who teaches you how to play a neat one-two pass. For example: always support your fellow actors, don't speak too quickly, and be aware that the audience won't leave the auditorium until the play is over and you've done your job."

bundesliga.com: What is it that you like about acting?

Hartwig: "I'm the kind of person who constantly has new ideas and wants to develop them. My time as a footballer, winning titles, the European Cup, playing international matches - that all happened in another lifetime, for me.

"Films and theatre, that's what my heart has been wanting for years. New projects are already bubbling away in my head. I know everyone is doing podcasts right now, and I'm thinking about a format without a studio and without a script, just going out on the street and letting people have their say. Let's see what happens."

bundesliga.com: Which former footballers or coaches would you have liked to share the theatre stage with?

Hartwig: "With my friend Franz Beckenbauer, as he would probably have had the talent for it. Or Günter Netzer. I would even have the perfect role for the great Ernst Happel: as the village magistrate ‘Adam’ in Heinrich Kleist's ‘The Broken Jug’. Like King Oedipus, ‘Adam’ is forced to judge a crime that he himself has committed. What an idea..."

bundesliga.com: As a player for 1860 Munich and Hamburg, you were regarded as a hard-hitting driving force in midfield. Did you feel like you were playing a role as a professional footballer?

Hartwig: "I didn't have to, but I did. As an illegitimate child with dark skin, I was exposed to everyday racism from an early age. I was rejected before I was even born. My mother's father was a terrible Nazi who threatened: ‘If that boy is born, I'll put a pillow on his face!’

"It didn't get any better when I started to play football - it got worse. I was regarded as the black guy with a small brain and lots of muscles. One who could run but wasn't expected to talk. I wan't afraid of mouthing off despite that, and now I know that was my way of not allowing myself to get ground down by it all.

"Once there were 20,000 Bayern fans abusing me with racist chants. If you experience something like that, it either breaks you or you gain the strength that motivates you to show all the idiots what you are about one day."

bundesliga.com: Is the theatre all that counts for you today? 

Hartwig: "That's right. It gives me great satisfaction when fellow actors or spectators recognise my performance as an actor and give me nice feedback. The silly old footballer Hartwig is now on the stage - who would have imagined?" 

bundesliga.com: What similarities are there between football and the theatre?

Hartwig: "Quite a lot, actually. The stadium and the stage. The team and the cast. The playmakers and the leading actors. They are both about entertaining spectators. You'll have your name chanted if you perform well, and in theatre you have to keep taking a bow if they keep applauding."

bundesliga.com: Your last Bundesliga match was 37 years ago. Unlike most former players, you still get applauded on a regular basis. Is that perhaps what attracts you to being an actor?

Hartwig: "I recently went golfing with Thomas Müller. Of course, we talked about his departure from Bayern. What you really miss when your career is over are the matchdays. The last coffee together in the hotel. The journey to the stadium. The massages and bandages. Then on Saturdays at 15:30, going out onto the pitch and playing football in front of 50,000 people. You never get that feeling again.

"If you don't have a sensible plan for when you hang up your boots, then you're screwed. I myself fell into a deep hole because I thought that all the hero worship would continue even when I wasn't playing anymore. But that's not the case. I've fallen flat on my face many times in my life, but fortunately, I've always got back up again. And that's what matters.

"Theatre and film have given me a whole new sense of confidence. I used to be considered an airhead, but you can't perform Shakespeare if you've got nothing in your head. I saw my old friend Kloppo again the other day. He greeted me with the words: ‘Oh, Mr Actor!’ That's how people define me today: as an actor, no longer as a footballer. That makes me proud."

bundesliga.com: Athletes and actors live for adulation. What is the best compliment you can receive?

Hartwig: "When someone who knew me as a footballer and now sees me as an actor says to me: ‘You've stayed grounded.’"

bundesliga.com: Finally, what's better: a standing ovation after the final act in the theatre or scoring against Bayern in front of 70,000 fans?

Hartwig: "Both are fantastic. A few years ago, I played Emperor Joseph II in ‘Amadeus’. After a performance at the Luisenburg Festival in Wunsiedel, we had to come back on stage ten times and the applause lasted for 15 minutes. It was only an open-air stage, but at that moment it felt like winning at the Bernabeu."

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