Dieter Kronzucker

After graduating from high school, he began studying philosophy and cultural history at the University of Munich. His studies also took him to Barcelona and then to Vienna before Kronzucker completed his doctorate in 1962. As early as 1962, Kronzucker joined WDR television in Cologne, where he initially worked in the regional program until 1965. He then moved to the current affairs department, where he worked on the political series "Monitor" and "Weltspiegel". Kronzucker became known to a larger, politically interested television audience through his incomparable, penetrating quality foreign reporting: During the phase heated by the student cultural revolution, the German television public became aware of the horrors of the Vietnam War in 1968/69 through Kronzucker's correspondent reports on ARD informed. Kronzucker then took care of "First's" Latin America coverage from Caracas until 1973. In 1973, Kronzucker joined NDR television in Hamburg, where he was deputy editor-in-chief of the current affairs department until 1977 and headed the editorial team of "Weltspiegel". In 1976, together with Peter Merseburger, he founded the satirical weekly program "extra drei". In 1978 he moved to ZDF, for which he headed the new format "heute-journal" until 1980. He then resumed his work as a foreign correspondent for the second channel, which this time took him to Washington. In the summer of 1980, Kronzucker's daughters were victims of a kidnapping in Tuscany, Italy. After paying over four million DM in ransom, the children were released. After his return, Kronzucker directed the ZDF news program again from 1986 to 1988. In 1988 he was appointed head of the "Adventures and Legends" editorial team, where he helped his concept of "infotainment", i.e. the successful mix of information and entertainment, to success through interestingly prepared reports from all over the world. In 1990, Kronzucker moved from public television to SAT.1, where he worked as program coordinator. At the private broadcaster he made a name for himself by presenting the political magazine "Quadriga" and the news program "Guten Abend, Deutschland". In 1993, Kronzucker took over the management of the SAT.1 studio in Washington. In the same year, the private broadcaster also broadcast his multi-part travel documentary "Kronzucker on the Road". From 2001 to 2007, Kronzucker taught reportage techniques at the Munich University of Film and Television. In the same year, the journalist was appointed presenter of the "Weltreporter" program on the private channel N24. The magazine "Kronzuckers Kosmos" followed in 2005, to which he gave his name, which is associated with journalism. Kronzucker was, among other things, Awarded the "Leo M. Goodman Award" in 1988. In 1989 he received the "Concord" prize. In 2002 he received the "Central German Media Prize Hans Klein" for his journalistic life's work, in 2007 the "Journalism Prize of the State Capital of Munich" and in 2008 the "Honorary Prize of the Bavarian Prime Minister" from the "Bavarian Television Prize". In 2009 he received the "Golden Prometheus" from Helios Verlag for his life's work.