The success of television series like the BritishIvanhoe, the FrenchThierry La Fronde and the FlemishJohan en de Alverman inspired, manager of NTS to make a similar series, set in the Netherlands. It was written by Gerard Soeteman. The series was filmed in black and white, and has been aired in reruns through the years. It has also been shown in East Germany and in Scotland.
Apart from Sindala and Floris, all the characters are based on historical figures. A divergence from history is the presence of the pirate Greate Pier: although a contemporary, he was not active as a pirate before the death of Philip the Handsome. In the series, Pier is either guarded or surrounded by members of the Arumer Zwarte Hoop. Although intended as a children's series, it was very popular with adults; for example, Floris's sword fight with two swords in the castle in the first episode looks surprisingly realistic. The series also had an educational element: customs, like timekeeping with bells, and the origin of words such as vernagelen, are explained by example. While Floris is portrayed as a typical knight-hero – not too bright but a good swordsman – Sindala is the clever one, using Oriental scientific knowledge for practical applications. Locations included the medieval castle of De Doornenburgh, close to Doornenburg in the Dutch province Gelderland, and the Belgian cities of Bruges and Ghent.
Production
Finding actors for the series was a problem because television was still regarded as inferior to the theatre. Hauer was introduced to Verhoeven as "maybe not such a good actor, but he will do and dare anything". Verhoeven was indeed worried by Hauer's lack of acting experience, but he looked good physically, could handle swords and ride horses well and did most of his stunts himself. The original name of the series was Floris and the Fakir and Verhoeven used two shot filming just in case. Hauer learned the TV acting fast enough. For the time it was a major production with 80 actors and 2500 extras. Verhoeven overspent the budget of 355,000 guilders by more than 300%. When this became clear, it was already too late to stop the production because Verhoeven used "vertical planning", in which the filming was done per actor instead of per episode. Stopping the production would mean that all work was lost. As a TV production of this scale had never been done before in the Netherlands, there was a lot of pioneering. Recordings were usually made in the studio, but Floris was mostly shot outside. Everyone on the set, including Verhoeven, had to learn the trade as they went. Tasks were also not strictly delineated, like they are these days; everyone was a bit of a jack of all trades. "We didn't stand with our arms folded smoking a cigarette when it wasn't our turn." Ironically, finding good locations for this TV production was difficult because the popularity of television had resulted in transmitting antennas being ubiquitous.
Collaboration
The series was the first major undertaking of both Hauer and Verhoeven, as well as their first collaboration. It was followed by Turkish Delight and Soldier of Orange ; ideas not used for the series were later included in the film Flesh and Blood, also directed by Verhoeven with Hauer in the lead role.
Episodes
Het gestolen kasteel
De koperen hond
De zwarte kogels
De man van Gent
De harige duivel
De vrijbrief
De drie narren
De alruin
Het brandende water
De wonderdoener
De Byzantijnse beker: Het toernooi
De Byzantijnse beker: De genezing
Related media
Export
The series was sold for redubbing to channels in the UK and also to East Germany. In the UK, the series aired on Yorkshire Television in 1970 as The Adventures of Floris. None of the English dubbed episodes survive.
Audio plays
Two of the unproduced scripts were produced as audio plays; they seem to be the same adventures as #6 and #8 of the newspaper comic adventures and #7 and #10 of the German remake.
Text stories
Photo-illustrated text stories of two episodes were serialised in the short-lived comic magazine Jamin Junior during 1972. These were "De Wonderdoener" and "De Zwarte Kogels". As publication of Jamin Junior was terminated rather suddenly, it is believed the second adaptation remained unfinished.
Newspaper comics
Starting in 1972 15 scripts for the Floris series were made into newspaper comics published in De Telegraaf by Gerrit Stapel. The art and dialogue were Stapel's, but the story Soeteman's, so the newspaper comics should be considered a canonical source of information about Floris's further adventures. Most important event in the comics is that Floris regains ownership of castle Rozenmondt in the 7th comics adventure.
German remake
1975 saw a West German remake of the series, Floris von Rosemund, again starring Rutger Hauer, but with German actor Derval de Faria as Sindala. This version, directed by Austrian director Ferry Radax, put much more emphasis on the comedic aspects of the stories and provided the female characters Ada and Viola with larger parts than the original. Strangely enough the East Germandub of the original Dutch, black and white, series was made two years after this, in 1977.
DVD
The original series has been released on DVD, as has the German remake; neither edition has any other languages or subtitles. However, fan made English subtitles exist for the Dutch series and all of its documentaries.
Film adaptation
The movie Floris was shot in 2003. It was directed by Jean van de Velde and features Michiel Huisman as the grandson of the original Floris. The new side-kick is Pi, a role played by pop starBirgit Schuurman. Some of the footage from the 1969 series with Hauer and Bergman is included. Hauer was originally asked to play the father of young Floris, but he declined.
Recovery of unfinished episodes
Some material had been filmed for two episodes which were never completed after the project was ended: Het Gericht, and De Bouwmeester. The former's screenplay had been used for the German remake as well. In 2016 the raw footage was found. While The architect amounted to only a few minutes, The tribunal was assembled, and ran just over 18 minutes when linked with sketches and narration where necessary to make up for the missing material. It was then shown at Doornenburg Castle, one of the old locations. All the material of both unfinished episodes was later made available online through on a regional Guelders broadcaster.
