He’s the middle manager who talks as if he’s the CEO—a champion of workplace inclusivity in his own mind, but a bigoted chauvinist the moment he speaks. Listening to him stirs a mix of familiarity and secondhand embarrassment that turns out to be surprisingly enjoyable.
Ricky Gervais’s cringe-inducing general manager of a soul-crushingly dull paper merchant in Slough vanished from regular British TV over twenty years ago, but the many comedic characters he inspired worldwide have outlived him.
In Germany, where a feature film based on a German sitcom inspired by The Office opens in cinemas this Thursday, some are even starting to suspect their own version of David Brent is now running the country.
The mockumentary sitcom Stromberg debuted on German TV in 2004, three years after the British series began; its creators denied it was based on the British show until the BBC threatened legal action. It ran for eight years, and the self-important wisdom of its title character, Bernd “Let papa sort it” Stromberg, has become inescapable on social media.
German federal elections earlier this year gave Stromberg meme culture a fresh boost, not just because Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s slim build and partial baldness resemble those of the office authoritarian played by comedian Christoph Maria Herbst.
“They are both boomers to the core and seem to lack any sensitivity to social cues,” said Lukas Lohmer, a German TV comedy writer. “The only difference is that Stromberg realizes when he makes a faux pas and often corrects himself.”
In recent weeks, Merz has caused fremdschämen (“vicarious embarrassment”), especially among younger Germans—like when he proclaimed on a trip to Angola how much he missed German bread, or when he asserted after returning from Belém, Brazil, that “everyone was delighted to be back in Germany and to have left that place.”
Like Stromberg, Merz insists he treats women as equals but can’t stop himself from making comments that suggest otherwise. The Christian Democrat politician, whose cabinet’s top roles are all held by men, told a party conference in 2021: “If I really had a problem with women, then my daughters would have shown me a yellow card by now—and my wife wouldn’t have married me 40 years ago.”
That remark was part of a “Who said it: Merz or Stromberg?” quiz in the Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper earlier this year. Other quotes included: “It’s all about equal rights until the ship starts sinking, and then it’s ‘women and children first’” (Stromberg) and “sheer coincidence that all the [meteorological] lows carry female names at the moment” (Merz).
On Instagram and TikTok, accounts tagged #Strommerz have taken clips of Merz and set them to the TV show’s theme tune, a jazz cover of Aphex Twin’s Flim. In one, the veteran conservative is joined in the Bundestag’s elevator by a female Green party politician. “With us, things are moving upwards,” he greets her. “And now I’m joining you,” she replies. “That makes the elevator a bit heavier,” says Merz, prompting awkward laughter from his entourage.
As Herbst said this week: “Stromberg couldn’t have come up with a better line than that.”
In this week’s episode of the podcast Schlag und Fertig, comedian Fabian Köster couldn’t contain his laughter as he shared his latest collection of the chancellor’s Stromberg-like moments: Merz playing to the camera as he waltzes into the chancellery for the first time, announcing, “Right, let’s take up the challenge”; Merz scolding his social media team for spelling mistakes on his teleprompter; Merz greeting th…The European Parliament’s president, Roberta Metsola, was greeted with a flamboyant “Robertaaa!”
“You have to say, it’s a completely different vibe than what we had with Olaf Scholz,” said Köster.
Merz’s own spokesperson has conceded that, at least regarding his hairstyle, “the chancellor can presumably not reject the comparison.” In all other aspects, he insisted, “the office culture and conversational tone inside the chancellery are clearly different from that in the series.”
While Stromberg uses the same workplace mockumentary format as the BBC show, the comedic tone and character traits differ significantly. “David Brent is at heart an entertainer who is desperate for applause,” said Lohmer. “Stromberg is an opportunist who yearns for an enviable career.”
Whereas The Office is set in a dead-end business, Stromberg takes place in a more aspirational insurance firm, Capitol Versicherung AG. The German show is played more as a straightforward comedy and doesn’t delve as deeply into kitchen-sink realism as Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant’s creation. Yet its plotlines are arguably bleaker, involving a suicide attempt and the death of a main character.
“Out of the British, American, and German versions of The Office, Stromberg is probably the darkest,” said Kai Hanno Schwind, an associate professor at Kristiania University College in Oslo, who wrote his doctorate comparing the German and British takes on the theme.
“The Office is essentially about failure, and in the British context, the biggest failure a character can experience is social embarrassment. In the German context, the biggest failure is not playing by the rules, but not being able to subvert them properly either.”
This predicament meant that while embarrassing, Stromberg was not always an entirely unsympathetic character, Schwind added. In the German show, there were moments when the audience laughed not just at him, but with him.
The new film, Stromberg – Wieder Alles Wie Immer (Everything as Usual Again), plays with this double bind. Set on the eve of a televised reunion of the original documentary cast, it features Stromberg super-fans with glued-on goatees gathering outside the TV studio and quoting his most sexist lines at feminist protesters.
Bernd Stromberg appears at first to have found a job at a modern company with shiny offices, though his role emerges as little more than a marketing gimmick to teach employees about outmoded workplace practices. Yet when he suffers a breakdown on live TV, Herbst’s character is rehabilitated in the public eye.
In one sequence, the filmmakers secured the real-life general secretary of Merz’s CDU to endorse their protagonist with all his dinosaur attitudes. “He doesn’t get everything right, but at least he does it,” says Carsten Linnemann.
“The joke about Stromberg was that he was past his sell-by date even 20 years ago,” said Lohmer. “The scary thing now is that this means he is embodying the zeitgeist more than ever.”
Frequently Asked Questions
FAQs The Return of Stromberg for the Merz Era
Q1 Who or what is Stromberg
A Bernd Stromberg is a fictional character from the acclaimed German mockumentary sitcom Stromberg He is the narcissistic incompetent and politically incorrect boss of a fictional insurance companys office whose management style became a cult symbol for toxic workplace culture
Q2 What does revived for the Merz era mean
A It means the character of Stromberg is being brought back or referenced in current public discourse because his traitscynicism a focus on superficial optics over substance and a certain ruthless oldschool managerial attitudeare seen as humorously or disturbingly reflective of the modern political climate particularly associated with CDU leader Friedrich Merz
Q3 Why is Stromberg being compared to Friedrich Merz
A Commentators and satirists draw parallels between Strombergs persona and perceptions of Merzs political style This includes a perceived lack of modern empathy a topdown patriarchal leadership approach a talent for sarcastic putdowns and an image of being a throwback to a more conservative corporatedominated era in German politics
Q4 Is this an official revival by the TV network
A Not necessarily While there have been special episodes in the past revived in this context often refers to a cultural and media revival The character is frequently used as a metaphor or shorthand in political commentary talk shows and satirical sketches to critique current affairs
Q5 What is the spirit of the times that Stromberg is said to capture now
A The current spirit includes widespread cynicism towards institutions frustration with bureaucratic inefficiency the resurgence of blunt unfiltered rhetoric in politics and a sense of nostalgia for a perceived simpler if less sensitive past Stromberg embodies these feelings in a comically exaggerated way
Q6 What are the benefits of using a fictional character like this for political commentary
