The Best TV Shows on VPRO

What do you do when you lose everything and have to start all over again? Ten-year-old Lucas, the middle child of a wealthy family, lives in an expensive neighborhood in a large house, equipped with every luxury. Everything changes completely when Lucas, while searching for his Sinterklaas surprise, finds a large box of unpaid bills. Father Maarten turns out to have enormous financial problems and the family loses everything. The family is evicted and, with the help of their cleaner Nina, finds shelter in an old office building among other new poor people. While father (Jeroen Spitzenberger) and mother (Hadewych Minis) have a hard time with themselves and each other, and big brother Thomas (15) and sister Emma (7) have a terrible time getting used to the new situation, Lucas tries to make the best of it with the highest goal: a Merry Christmas for the whole family.

Debiteuren Crediteuren is a satire of boring office life and repetitive corporate culture. The series focuses on three colleagues and their secretary working in a financial administration office. Each episode follows a rigid pattern: mundane small talk, bad jokes, office supplies obsession (like "stiften"), and lunch breaks involving specific sandwiches. I was made by the Dutch absurdist comedy show Jiskefet and originally aired on the VPRO network.

China is playing an increasingly important role worldwide. Under President Xi Jinping, substantial investments are being made in communication and cooperation and industrious Chinese people are settling abroad in large numbers. Documentary maker and China expert Ruben Terlou visits them in the new VPRO travel series ‘The World of the Chinese’. Who are they, what do they want to achieve and what impact does their presence have on the local population?

Pat & Mat is a Czech stop-motion animated series featuring two handymen, Pat and Mat. It was created by Lubomír Beneš and Vladimír Jiránek.

Sint Hubertusberg is the final Jiskefet series, set in a bleak and surreal retirement home. It is a tragicomic satire of elderly care, blending absurd humor with a poignant, often painful realism.

Draadstaal is a satirical sketch comedy television program of the VPRO, and CCCP 2 Dutch production company and broadcaster. It was created by CCCP and Jeroen van Koningsbrugge and Dennis van de Ven. The show features lots of recurring stereotypical characters. The program is reminiscent of the work of Van Kooten en De Bie.

De Lullo's is a satirical series that parodies Dutch student fraternity culture. It follows three wealthy, arrogant, and lazy students living in a fraternity house. The sketches mock their elitism, misogyny, and detached lifestyle. I was made by the Dutch absurdist comedy show Jiskefet and originally aired on the VPRO network.

Multilul is a satirical take on the advertising and media world by the Dutch absurdist comedy show Jiskefet. It aired in late 1998 on the VPRO network. It follows the staff of a pretentious marketing agency (Creative Advertising, Media and Communication Consultant Agency) as they brainstorm absurd campaigns. The series mocks corporate jargon, pseudo-creative processes, and industry narcissism.

The series tells the life story of Johnny Jordaan, from his early years to his fame as the Netherlands' greatest folk singer. This also includes great fellow artists such as Wim Sonneveld and Willy Alberti from Jordaan's life. Then Johnny discovers that he harbors homosexual feelings, something that was a big taboo in the mid-50s.

A series of eight episodes documenting 250.000 years of history. Charles Groenhuijsen takes us along sights and locations that historically harbored various inhabitants of ‘The Lowlands’. In what today is known as The Netherland, Belgium, Germany, New York, Ghana, Surinam, and Indonesia, Charles will be looking for the stories of ‘our’ past through potsherds, bones, stones, ancient text's, drawings, paintings, pictures, radio, and tv- fragments