Picture Credit: Netflix
Netflix is heading to the Wiesn. Six weeks after Netflix Germany revealed that Simon Verhoeven would be making his Netflix debut with a romantic comedy shot in the middle of the real Oktoberfest, we now have the cast, and it’s headlined by two of Germany’s biggest names on the service: Jeanne Goursaud (Exterritorial, Barbarians) and Jannis Niewöhner (Munich: The Edge of War). We’ve also got the first image from the set (see above).
Currently going under the working title Oktoberfest, the movie is written and directed by Simon Verhoeven, who is best known in Germany for a string of box office comedies including Männerherzen, Willkommen bei den Hartmanns and Nightlife (the latter of which has previously streamed on Netflix in Germany). More recently, he directed the Milli Vanilli biopic Girl You Know It’s True. This is the first time he’s worked with Netflix.
Producing is Wiedemann & Berg Film, which should be a familiar name to anyone who has followed Netflix’s German output over the years. Quirin Berg and Max Wiedemann were the producers behind Dark, Netflix’s very first German Original, and the company has since worked with Netflix on titles like Fall for Me and The Grimm Reality. Kirstin Winkler also produces.
Netflix first announced the project on September 16, 2026 via a German-language press release, but at the time, kept the cast completely under wraps. Today’s announcement fills in those blanks.
What’s the plot of Netflix’s Oktoberfest rom-com?
Netflix’s pitch for the movie boils down to one question: can you really fall in love between beer and pretzels?
Goursaud plays Miri, a quick-witted Oktoberfest waitress and single mother whose life is complicated enough before she bumps into Tom, played by Niewöhner. Tom is a stressed-out businessman who has flown in from New York to Munich on a clear-cut assignment, only to find himself stranded at the festival with his plans in tatters. The two come from completely different worlds but, as these things tend to go, find they have more in common than they’d like to admit as the chaos builds around them.
Here’s the official synopsis from Netflix:
Can you really fall in love between beer and pretzels? Director Simon Verhoeven is firmly convinced of this and dedicates his first Netflix film to the magic and madness of Oktoberfest. A wild world full of intoxication and romance, where people collide who would probably never meet in normal life.
Verhoeven, for his part, seems to have a pretty clear-eyed view of the festival’s romantic potential:
Oktoberfest is a wonderful, crazy place. Nowhere else can you experience perhaps the most romantic kiss of your life while someone is throwing up two meters away. People let their guard down quickly here, and that leads to surprising, honest, human encounters.
Who is in the cast of Oktoberfest?
Picture Credits: IMDb / Getty Images
Netflix’s description of the cast as a “stellar ensemble” isn’t far off. Here’s who has been confirmed:
- Jeanne Goursaud as Miri. Goursaud is arguably Netflix’s biggest German star right now. She led Barbarians for two seasons, starred in Dear Child, plays Alice Vidal in the French crime drama Blood Coast, and then, of course, headlined Exterritorial, which went on to become one of Netflix’s most-watched non-English movies of all time. It still sits at number 4 on that list.
- Jannis Niewöhner as Tom. Netflix subscribers will know him as Paul von Hartmann in Munich: The Edge of War. He’s most recently been seen in the German drama 22 Bahnen.
- Senta Berger, Michaela May, Eisi Gulp and Marlene Morreis, all veteran Munich actors.
- Bosse Hopperdietz, a newcomer.
- Peter Gallagher, best known to Netflix audiences as Nick in Grace and Frankie (and to everyone else as Sandy Cohen in The O.C.).
- Fisher Stevens, who you’ll recognize from Succession.
- Bart Edwards, who played Duny in the first season of The Witcher.
Given the New York angle to Tom’s story, we’d assume the American contingent (Gallagher and Stevens) are tied to his side of the plot, though Netflix hasn’t confirmed any character details beyond the two leads.
When will Oktoberfest be released on Netflix?
Filming began on September 15, 2026, right as the festival was getting underway at Theresienwiese, with the crew shooting among thousands of real festival-goers, inside the real beer tents and across the grounds. The remaining scenes are now being shot at Studio Penzing near Munich, where Netflix says the world of Oktoberfest is being “elaborately recreated.” Netflix’s original announcement in September suggested around 4,000 extras would be involved in the tent rebuild.
Netflix hasn’t given a release date or even a window yet. The project wasn’t part of the 17-title German slate Netflix unveiled back in January, so it’s a new addition. With filming running through at least the autumn of 2026 and a comedy of this scale needing a decent post-production period, we’d expect it to land at some point in 2027. Releasing it in the run-up to Oktoberfest 2027 (which kicks off in September) would make a lot of sense, but that’s our speculation rather than anything Netflix has said.
We’ll add it to our list of upcoming German Netflix titles and to our rom-com tracker.
Netflix did previously have a very different Oktoberfest project in Oktoberfest: Beer & Blood, the 2020 period drama, which sadly left the service last October.
Are you excited for a rom-com set at Oktoberfest? Let us know in the comments below.