RTL was his "baby" Pioneer of private television Helmut Thoma is dead
Helmut Thoma led RTL to success. The media manager was known for his intuition and gut decisions. In his prime, he was known as the "king of private television".
26.05.2025, 10:44
26.05.2025, 10:45
dpa
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- Helmut Thoma, who was considered a formative figure in German private television, died in Vienna on May 3, 2025 on his 86th birthday.
- Thoma built RTL into a leading broadcaster from the 1980s onwards, relying on prominent faces and formats with high ratings, for which he was sometimes criticized, but also received many awards.
- Even after his time at RTL, Thoma remained active as a media expert and was involved in television as a consultant and with his own projects, among other things.
He was the man who made RTL big: for the Austrian Helmut Thoma, the Cologne-based private broadcaster was his "baby".
His family has now informed the Austrian news agency APA that the media manager died of heart failure in Vienna on May 3 - his 86th birthday.
Thoma had made RTL the most successful commercial television channel in Germany in the 80s and 90s - he was considered the "king of private television".
Under Thoma, RTL became one of the greats in the TV landscape
Thoma came to the media industry in a roundabout way. Born in Vienna, he first completed a dairy apprenticeship in Austria, then studied law and joined the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation (ORF) as a legal advisor.
After working for an RTL advertising subsidiary and in radio, Thoma became director of the German programs of RTL and RTL plus in 1984. The relocation of RTL from Luxembourg to Cologne and the entry of Bertelsmann marked the beginning of the station's rise, which Thoma led as sole managing director from 1991. In the beginning, RTL was a 25-man operation, Thoma recalled on his 80th birthday.
He built up a TV powerhouse at breakneck speed, signing viewer magnets such as Thomas Gottschalk, Hans-Joachim Kulenkampff and Karl Dall. Some presenters - such as Ulla Kock am Brink and Hans Meiser - also owe or owed their popularity to the long-standing RTL boss, as did the actresses Hella von Sinnen and Esther Schweins.
Thoma himself did not shy away from the limelight - and pithy words. He once accused the Bertelsmann Group of "electronic madness" in front of the cameras because of its plans for digital television.
Naked skin and high ratings
The manager's flippant remarks were just as well-known as his feel for the media world and his gut decisions. Critics criticized the slapstick, violence and sex in the RTL program. Hugo Egon Balder hosted the show "Tutti Frutti", which featured a lot of naked skin, and late-night erotic films in lederhosen.
Thoma countered with high viewing figures and advertising revenue. The daily soap "Gute Zeiten, schlechte Zeiten" (GZSZ) and the purchase of Formula 1 broadcasting rights also contributed to his success. At the same time, he strengthened the information offering - also to avert image problems.
Despite the many critical voices, the RTL boss was named "Media Man of the Year" in 1989. In 1990, he received the Golden Camera, followed two years later by the German Media Award. This was followed in 1994 by the Emmy Award from the US National Academy of Television, Arts and Sciences. The competition also paid tribute to Thoma: former Sat.1 program director Fred Kogel once called him the "King of German private television".
New tasks for the media expert
In his post-RTL life, Thoma took on a new role in 1999: he began working as a media consultant for North Rhine-Westphalia's then Prime Minister Wolfgang Clement (SPD). And he was also involved in several supervisory boards. Thoma remained in demand as a media expert on various topics for a long time.
In the summer of 2014, at the age of 75, he also tried something new and launched NIX: a TV format developed by regional broadcaster NRW-TV in Düsseldorf, with which he wanted to win young people back to live television. The offer did not last long.
Thoma, who lived near Cologne for a long time, was also a media man in his private life: he once listed television, listening to the radio, reading newspapers and media politics as his hobbies. For his 80th birthday on May 3, 2019, he surprised everyone by becoming a hobby diver. He commuted between Vienna and Luxembourg and was taking it easy overall, he said at the time.
Thoma was married several times, including to his former assistant Daniele Milbert, from whom he separated in 1997 and with whom he got back together in 2004. Milbert wrote a book about their marriage, the title of which sounds almost like an obituary: "My life with Mr. RTL".
