For decades, Flanders has been building a strong TV and cinema industry, powered by locally groomed talents and creators who navigate easily between feature film, TV and now streaming projects. Actor Kevin Janssens started his career in this ecosystem with national and international hits such as Robin Pront’s “D’Ardennen” or Coralie Fargeat’s “Revenge.”
In 2020, after almost 20 years in the industry, Janssens felt it was time to step behind the camera and craft a dream-project that, he thought, needed to be told. Six years later, Janssens and co-director Filip Lenaerts brought “Breendonk” to its world premiere at Séries Mania, the now-unmissable Series Festival in the North of France.
A six-part limited series tale of resilience, resistance and the choices one has to make when faced with the atrocities of World War II Nazi occupation, “Breendonk” weighs in as an eye-opening series inspired by the real-life story of Belgium’s most infamous labor camp. Variety accessed in exclusivity a clip from the series
“‘Breendonk’ is “a gripping, high-quality period drama that may be set in the past, but feels strikingly relevant today. At its heart are characters who must navigate difficult decisions we can all relate to: what is right, what is wrong, and how do you act when everything is at stake?” Said Wim Janssen, VRT head of drama. “We love bringing powerful local stories to life and connecting them with our audience. With VRT, we do this every day. And with New8, we now have the opportunity to share those stories with a much wider European audience.”
“At Studio TF1, we are always drawn to stories that ignite conversation and spark reflection,” added Camille Dupeuble, EVP International TV & Digital Distribution at Studio TF1. “It is this moral complexity that gives “Breendonk” its universal resonance and emotional impact. We are very proud to present the series to international audiences this year at Series Mania and we hope it will move viewers as deeply as it has moved us.”
“Breendonk” will make its world premiere at Series Mania on March 25, with a screening of its two first episodes. The series is a Belgian co-production between De Mensen, Anagram, VRT, Streamz and New8.
Variety talked to Kevin Janssens and Filip Lenaerts in the runup to the world premiere of “Breendonk.”
Kevin, you initiated this project. Why was sharing this story important to youmand what is your connection with this part of Belgian history?
Janssens: The real camp of Breendonk [which has since been turned into a memorial museum] is roughly 12 miles from where I live, in Antwerp. I think I was 14 or 15 when I visited Breendonk for the first time, and I was really overwhelmed by this place with its concrete bunker, and discovering all the atrocities that happened there. Not only perpetrated by the Nazis, but also by Flemish guards who oversaw the prisoners. Prisoners that were themselves ordinary people, young men like me or Filip. It was an eye-opening experience, and from that point on, I started reading a lot about this history. It soon became evident that, in Belgium, that part of history never translated to fiction. There had been a few documentaries, but nothing fictional about this almost taboo part of Belgian history. That also triggered my will to craft a story around that camp. Something that would be about humanity, moral complexity and the choices ordinary people have to (or decide to) make in a not so ordinary situation, and how they deal with the consequences.
You’ve mostly played in feature films, yet you decided to make your directorial debut as a series’ director, did you always envision ‘Breendonk’ as a TV series?
Janssens: Yes. There are so many stories to be told, and so many real testimonies or facts to draw from. It took us many drafts and rewrites to find the right entry point, because as you build this type of content, you can’t just make six episodes of people being tortured. We didn’t want to shy away from the reality of this history, and everything you see in Breendonk camp really happened, but we also wanted to craft a captivating narrative with complex characters. It’s a fictional story that could be true, and I feel like this length is what we needed to reach that level of storytelling.
Breendonk
How did you start collaborating as a duo?
Janssens: Six years ago, the head of production at De Mensen who introduced me to Filip, and I told him about my project. He started reading a lot about Breendonk, and only a couple days later, we met again and he was completely in.
Lenaerts: For me, boarding this project meant diving into the real stories of this camp. As Kevin mentioned, it was quite a challenge to find the right way to share this story, as things inside the prison camp were very static, with guards holding absolute control on the prisoners. In truth, they couldn’t do much, besides enduring this daily terror. Diving deeper into the testimonies of survivors, we found small acts of heroism, of fighting back to preserve their dignity. From there on, we started to build our characters.
In ‘Breendonk’, these characters are played by veteran Flemish actors as well as rising talents. How did you make your casting choices?
Janssens: From the beginning, some parts were already clear to me. Leon, the Father, had to be Koen [De Bouw], but we had some early difficulties finding the actor who would play his son Rick. Jolan [De Bouw], who also happens to be a friend of mine, was suggested to me several times and I knew of his talent as he had already played in shorts and other productions. At first, I was skeptical, but one day I saw him playing with kids and he started to act in a way that I had never seen him do before, and that’s what made up my mind. We asked him to audition, and it was an almost immediate decision after that. Jolan is really good, knows how to use silence, place tension in them, and there’s of course the fact that Koen and him are father and son both on screen and in real life. The chemistry between them is real.
To match Rick’s character, we wanted an actress that would embody our strong, modern lead Elizabeth. It was important to both Filip and I that this character would have her own ideology, her own needs and desires, without reverting back to a suppressed female character. Anne-Laure Vandeputte brought that attitude and strength to the project, as well as a subtle vulnerability, and Jolan and her worked very well together.
Kevin, you also star as Hendrik Vaes, one of the main characters of the show. How did it feel being on both sides of the camera, and was it important for you to portray Vaes, a character who collaborates with the Nazis?
Janssens: It was not my intention in the beginning to act in “Breendonk” as s well as directing it. But as we were writing more and more, Filip suggested that I should be a part of the cast as well, playing Vaes. To be frank, it was very hard, and I had to be very focused, but being on a set is like a second home for me. And eventually, it was a fantastic experience. Regarding Vaes, it was very important to us from the start that “Breendonk” would not be a WWII story focused on heroism and resisting the occupation, but rather an exploration of the dilemmas and moral ambiguity. As a character, Vaes (an interpreter who we discover as he’s already working with the Nazis) is intelligent, and very good at adapting. By the time we meet him, the tide of war is already changing, and yet he still believes he can always stay one step ahead, until he’s forced to confront the consequences of his choices. What interested us was to depict human beings in a situation where internal conflicts are made even more pressing and important by a foreign power. What would we have done in his place back then? I really don’t know, so that’s what made him so interesting to portray for me.
What you mention is also what makes ‘Breendonk’ so universally relevant, beyond its historical approach. As artists, what made you want to share this project now, and how would you say it’s relevant in today’s world?
Lenaerts: Because we didn’t want to make entertainment for its own sake, we really wanted to work with the moral dilemmas of that period, and the severe crisis that was World War II in recent history. We put our characters continuously through these moral dilemmas: collaboration or defiance; helping others, or self-preservation or opportunism or facing your responsibility. Whatever they choose, there’s always a price to pay. Beyond drama, we are also holding a mirror for the audience. When do you rebel? When is enough, enough? Questions that are unfortunately still relevant today. In the six years it took us to make “Breendonk,” the world has changed, and we have the feeling that the forces that led to Breendonk 80 years ago are more active than ever before. In fact, you can see Breendonks everywhere in the world, from Syria to Ukraine or Russia, and these kinds of camps say a lot about our level of humanity. So I think it’s definitely relevant to tell this story today. We can never forget and “Breendonk” reminds us about how easily ordinary people can be drawn into systems of oppression.
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