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Cape Town – The tousled side-hair are gone. So is the moustache.
Oubaas got a big makeover and looks strikingly different – as the actor and director Pierre van Pletzen is getting ready to make his appearance as a brand-new character in kykNET's (DStv 144) Afrikaans soap Getroud met Rugby from early 2018.
After he was unceremoniously fired in June by Danie Odendaal Productions producing the SABC's Afrikaans weekday soap 7de Laan on SABC2, van Pletzen was snapped up for his acting and directing services by several TV productions doing shows for rival pay-TV broadcaster M-Net's Afrikaans language kykNET channel.
This year van Pletzen started appearing in kykNET's comedy Phil 101 and the reality show Die Ooms se Band on VIA (DStv 147) while the number of his 7de Laan scenes earlier this year dramatically got downsized and dwindled until he got his marching orders.
Now the widely respected and veteran artist has found new professional life both on-screen and off.
From 15 January van Pletzen will make his first appearance on-screen on kykNET's Afrikaans soap Getroud met Rugby as a new character.
The clean-shaven character – complete with gold chain around the neck – is light years removed from the curmudgeonly, bumbling, old-man jersey wearing caretaker of The Heights where Pierre played a character decades older than his real age.
His off-screen role
Besides his on-screen role in Getroud met Rugby, van Pletzen is also heading up the directing team at the new kykNET comedy, Die Kasteel (The Castle) with Josh Rous and Andre Odendaal.
Episodes of Die Kasteel is currently being recorded at Sasani Studios in Johannesburg in front of a live studio audience as part of a 26-episode first season order.
Die Kasteel, also starting in January 2018 on kykNET is produced by Rous House Productions.
Starring Dorette Potgieter and Hannes Muller as former beauty queen Tina-Marie and her husband Eckard, a high society couple decides to turn their "castle" – their mansion in the posh suburb of Waterkloof – into a boutique hotel due to financial problems, where "Fawlty Towers" type shenanigans ensue as they try to run an accomodation establishment.
(Photo supplied: kykNET)
