Trivia / Samson En Gert

• Acting for Two:
  • Walter De Donder (who plays the mayor) also played his twin brother Basiel in several episodes.
  • Ditto for Walter van de Velde (Octaaf) who played his identical cousin named Walter in the episode Neef Walter.
  • Danny Verbiest (Samson) and Koen Crucke (Alberto) have both appeared on the show as themselves. Danny also performed the voice of a parrot in the episode Coco.
  • In the special episode Het Verrassingsfeest, Walter Baele (Van Leemhuyzen) also showed up in the role of prince (now king) Philip of Belgium.
• Actor-Shared Background: Koen Crucke, who plays barber Alberto Vermicelli, did really follow a hairdressers education in his younger years and has actually worked in a barbershop for some time. Furthermore, he is also an actual opera singer, still preforming opera to this day.
• Banned Episode: The episode Baby Vermist has never been aired because the plot of the episode (a baby accidentally getting lost from its parents) was deemed too similar to the case of the Belgian serial killer Marc Dutroux, who was at the time being persecuted for the kidnapping, torturing, raping and murdering of young girls. While the episode was never transmitted on television, it has been released on a DVD.
• Cash-Cow Franchise: The series served as this for production company Studio 100. Samson En Gert alongside Kabouter Plop and Piet Piraat is one of the company's most profitable IPs with the three aforementioned franchise still making live appearances at numerous live shows and special events across Belgium.
• The Danza: Gert Verhulst as Gert. Although in the first seasons, he wasn't playing a character. It was a case of him appearing as himself. Only when the series became Cash-Cow Franchise, Gert decided to distinguish himself from his fictional counterpart.
  • The same principle was held in 2019, when Gert Verhulst departed from the show and got replaced by his own daughter Marie Verhulst, who kept her own name inside the show's universe.
• Edited for Syndication: All episodes from before around 1998 have undergone multiple edits to make them suitable for reruns.
• Executive Meddling: Frieda Kroket was written out of the series after only three seasons according to the demands of Ketnet, who aired the show. They thought the character had too little educational value.
• Follow the Leader: The Flemish childrens show Big en Betsy from 1999 has a very similar format to Samson en Gert, it being a sitcom for children about a girl living together with a talking pig and dealing with a cast of humoristic side characters. Interesting is that both Big en Betsy and Samson en Gert were made by the same creators, with the only difference that Samson en Gert was made for the public television while Big en Betsy was meant for the commercial television network.
• Fountain of Expies: The show has become such a staple in Flemish television culture that Samson is a well-loved subject for parodies and impressions in Flemish comedy.
• Keep Circulating the Tapes: Home video releases are rather limited, and while the show is still regularly rerun, many episodes are left out due to various reasons, including the episodes not having been remastered in HD, the earlier episodes having a different format or the broadcast tapes just straight up being lost.
• Live on Stage!: The show has produced a yearly Live On Stage show since 1991. Adults that saw the earlier shows as kids are taking their kids now. It's one of the better examples of this trope due to all the actual actors from the series itself being involved. Kabouter Plop and Piet Piraat followed the same approach with the same actors still reprising their roles for almost 20 years.
• Never Work with Children or Animals: As there are several episodes that feature living animals, the production has experienced some trouble with them:
  • The weight of the elephant in the episode De olifant nearly caused the floor of the set to collapse, while Danny Verbiest playing Samson was underneath.
  • For the episode De tijger, the production had to film a real tiger walking out of a cage. In order to film this, they cleared all crew from the studio and let the cameras roll unmanned while the tiger's cage was unlocked. Koen Crucke however, had to come to the studio later that day and happened to arrive just when the tiger was outside his cage. The technical director luckily managed to get him out quickly before something happened.
• One-Steve Limit: The main cast features three actors named "Walter": Walter De Donder (the mayor), Walter Van De Velde (Octaaf) and Walter Baele (Van Leemhuyzen).
• Product Placement: The franchise has licensed many food products to be sold with the likeness of Samson on it, such as Samson lemonade, Samson biscuits and Samson bologna sausage. Many of those licensed products can be seen in episodes of the television series, which creates a very curious example of the Celebrity Paradox, by a series featuring its own merchandise in its fictional universe.
• Real-Life Relative: In 2019, Gert Verhulst announced his departure from the show and had his role as Samson's companion taken by his own daughter Marie Verhulst.
  • Also, in one of the early episodes, the mayor's twin brother Basiel was played by actor Walter De Donder's real brother Eric. In his later appearances, Basiel was played by Walter himself though.
• Real Life Writes the Hairstyle: Averted. Both Koen Crucke (Alberto) and Walter Van de Velde (Octaaf) had a real moustache when they started their roles in the series, but they both shaved it off in later years. In the series, they wore fake moustaches hereafter.
• Recycled Script: As as much as 797 episodes were made between 1990 and 2017, there are quite a lot of later episodes that are actually remakes or variations on previous episodes.
• The Cast Showoff:
  • Combined with Actor Allusion, Koen Crucke (who plays Alberto Vermicelli) is a professional opera singer in real life, while his character is an amateur singer in the local opera society.
  • Walter Baele (who plays Van Leemhuyzen) is known as an impressionist and comedic actor, which he has also been able to show in some episodes. The episode Leuk Winkelen even entirely revolves about Van Leemhuyzen having to do impressions of the other characters. In the special episode Het Verrassingsfeest, Baele played a dual role as he also showed up as his impression of prince (currently king) Philip of Belgium.
• The Other Darrin: Samson has been voiced by three different actors: Danny Verbiest from 1989 to 2005, Peter Thyssen from 2005 to 2013 and Dirk Bosschaert from 2013 to present.
• The Other Marty: In the Walloon version, Gert (known as Fred) and Meneer de Burgemeester are played by a different actor.
• Milestone Celebration: Since 2009, Studio100 has been making special anniversary songs for the series. "Droom" for the show's 20th Anniversary, "Hiep hiep hiep hoera!" for it's 25th anniversary, and "Het allerlaatste liedje" for the show's 30th Anniversary in 2019. The 30th anniversary song also served as a farewell song from Samson and Gert. In December 2019, Gert was replaced with Marie as Samson's new companion.
• What Could Have Been: Samson was originally going to be called Bob.
• Word of Gay: Koen Crucke has stated in interviews that his character Alberto is gay, although this has never been explicitely confirmed in the series or by the makers.
• Written by Cast Member: Danny Verbiest (Samson) wrote almost all of the episodes of the show.
• Write Who You Know: Danny Verbiest has admitted in interviews that some of the characters are loosely inspired by real people he knew. For example, Octaaf was based on a neighbour of Verbiest who was constantly boasting about his 'specialities', and the mayor was inspired by a real mayor who, according to Verbiest, wasn't very good at his job because he was more busy with pigeon racing than with the town.