Knife Skills: An Interview with Thomas Goersch
The self-made German actor/director/producer/manager and maniacal gourmand Thomas Goersch. Well honed knife skills for butchering fabricated cuts of meat in the kitchen and for butchering female victims on film. Don’t let one twisted persona on film fool you though, he is a well rounded actor of the stage and screen starring in over 200 movies. Currently directing his latest movie Living in a Box and starring in the upcoming Boogeyman movie as well as Memoir of a Cannibal. Writing for food magazines, writing books, testing products and hosting his own cooking show called Goersch Genießer Buffet for 4 years running on TV — the show has over 1 million followers. Admittedly, his film work has culminated in collaborations with infamous director Marian Dora in Voyage To Agatis which is a an unforgettable journey of savage art and beauty like never witnessed before. Goersch has also starred in Dora’s latest opus titled Carcinoma. Lets practice our knife skills and the art of butchery. Grab the filleting knife, cut through that subcutaneous layer of fat, get to the meat and carve along the bone as close as we can to get the real scoop on Thomas Goersch.
Are you Marian Dora!? I mean the man is practically unknown, is it because of the subject matter of his movies and he has a family and regular office job so he wants to keep them separate? I know you communicate for him sometimes. Why is he so elusive?
No, I am not Marian Dora. I was asked this before several times. I guess no one can imagine that other than the director himself is working hard on a project, so they guess it must be me. I really don’t like these pseudonym names. I have to be authentic all the time, with all my things I am doing. That’s me, all Thomas. I was sometimes something like the secretary of Marian and the punching ball for the people, when they weren’t able to contact him, they shouted at me. This was no fun.
You have taken on some different or extreme roles. What is the most crazy thing you’ve done on screen for a movie? Do you have any limitations with what you will do on camera or does anything go?
I don’t think about it in categories like “crazy things.” I have to respect the character I am playing. I have to understand why the character is doing the things, which are in the script. If you understand the character, than everything is possible. You don’t have to love the things the character is doing. Maybe the craziest thing was to prepare the bowel in “Voyage to Agatis”
We talked about this before briefly. You have a culinary show on a shopping channel in Germany. Please tell us about it. You also said sometimes it’s on for three hours. Are you a crazy culinary maniac on this show!?
Sometimes it’s live six hours in one day on air. I am an expert for gourmet food and wine. Sometimes also cheese and smoked fish. it’s called Goersch Genießer Buffet, in English Goersch Gourmet Buffet. I am not a maniac, it’s more of a funny show.
What are some of your upcoming projects? Anything horror/exploitation or underground related?
Right now I am shooting as director of the movie Living in a Box. I am playing in the movie a mad director forcing his actors to play naked in his movie. After this The Winds in the Distance, a German movie about racism. I am looking forward to Boogeyman : Reincarnation, which will be released later this year. This week the Swedish/Polish movie Andy Warhol to si vrati was in the cinemas in Poland. And we are preparing a pilot show for an upcoming Travel/Food Magazine titled Biking and Food in…. We cross some countries and cook in the style of the area.
Is acting and entertainment your full time job? Do you work any regular 9-5 jobs to make a living?
I do have something like a patchwork job. Hosting the cooking show, writing on scripts and my upcoming cooking book, speaking for documentations, dubbing foreign movies, acting, writing articles for magazines, and I do have an actors agency. I also made seven years a radio show as the host.
How did you come to meet Marian Dora?
We had a common friend Carl Andersen. I was playing in Carl’s movie Eiszeit, just for one day and Marian Dora made just for this day the making of. So we met and I had no idea who he was.
Tell us about his latest movie Carcinoma, which you also star in.
It’s the true story about a man suffering under cancer. He is not going to the doctor and lives all his pain. My part was his best friend. A strange guy, motivating the guy to make strange things.
Tell us about Hansel And Gretel the movie? I have ever seen it? Is it faithful to the original story?
This was my greatest defeat. I was going on as a producer to a German anthology about the Tales of Brother’s Grimm. A modern horror story: eight directors. A bad idea. A complete disaster. We had to cancel everything.
What is your opinion on animal cruelty in movies? Do you agree with it if it is necessary to get a point across? Look at old Cannibal movies like Cannibal Holocaust by Ruggero Deodato, or Cannibal Ferox by Umberto Lenzi, or Japanese stuff like Men Behind The Sun. Dora is also known for animal cruelty in his movies.
I hate animal cruelty, there is no reason to do that.
What other horror movie projects have you worked on in the past?
I am preparing my own directors work Behind the Camera. The Tent by Hakan Haslaman, The Hunch by Philip Polcar, Mors in Tabula (The Profane Exhibit) by Marian Dora, Boogeman : Reincarnation by Ulli Lommel, Memoir of a Cannibal by L.B.Hyams, and The Curse of the White Woman by Sahra Jansen. (For more of Thomas’s work visit his overview on IMDb).
What is a normal day in the life of Thomas Goersch?
That’s the difference — there are no normal days. Sometimes cooking shows, shooting movies as director, writing, promoting myself and office office work, acting, modelling, casting — I need 36 hours a day!
What was it like playing the role of Raphael in Voyage To Agatis? Did you actually cut open that sea cucumber and start eating it raw? Any weird feelings or what were your thoughts when you had to knife the girl in the crotch? This movie was so brutal — your performance cold and calculated and the lady in the role of your wife was amazing, I couldn’t believe what I was watching. She was so against what your character was doing and then she was masturbating when you started taunting the other girl. The movie is so unforgettable and disturbing. It’s one of my favorites and your performance really stood out.
Playing Raphael was pure fun. We shot the movie in a really short time, so there was not much time to think about it. I dived for the sea cucumber and I ate it. Raw, no faking, nothing. Just me and the cucumber. Tatjana, my wife in Agatis, and me played again together in Boogeyman: Reincarnation by Ulli Lommel. We are good friends. Raphael’s character was great — a real asshole.
Will you have any future collaborations with Dora?
I have no idea. There are no plans. There is still our short movie Mors in Tabula in The Profane Exhibit to be released.
How did you get started in acting?
First steps in the business were host of my own radio show, writing scripts and the hard job as an extra. A sword fighter in Peter Hyam’s The Musketeer beside Tim Roth and Catherine Deneuve.
I understand you are a broad actor and artist and I know you don’t want every question to be affiliated with Marian Dora.
Its always Marian Dora when the people are contacting me. It’s boring and reducing me on a marionette of Marian. I am quite more, much more in Comedy, Drama and Art.
Back to culinary, as I told you before I am a cook by trade. What is your favorite dish to cook and what is your specialty?
I love Italian, Greek, Georgian and Chinese food. But my favorite is Sauerbraten, a German dish. Beef in a marinade of vinegar and swabian pasta. I could die for it!
Is there anything you’d like to say to your fans and supporters about your upcoming projects? Thank you for your time and patience. You are an interesting actor with a great career to follow. Thank you for taking the time to answer my sometimes silly questions.
I am on the way for my own work as director. Small Window of Happiness and Living in a Box to come. Films with a message, nudity and provocations. As an actor I am going on to play more in international productions, so that my fans are able to see more movies in their countries.
