“Rich and Famous” and the power of friendships

The Building Bridges movie club will discuss the movie “Rich and Famous” on Sunday, February 8th, 2026. I am probably the only person among the Building Bridges community who saw this movie when it first came out in the 1980s due to my admiration for the actor David Selby.  I had the pleasure of having a conversation with David Selby a few weeks after my father had passed a few years ago.

What really got me thinking at that time was the challenges and power of friendships, which last the course of time. I honestly admit that I was hoping to find those friendships in my own life one day when I first watched “Rich and Famous.” I need to mention that I didn’t have that many friends when I was a teenager, which was mainly due to being a farmer's son and having to deal with the blessing and curse that came with it.

Furthermore, I grew up in a household with two distant parents, who were always there but had entirely different ideas for my life than I did. As a father myself, I have been trying to support my children on their quest to find their own paths in life. But others, like me, were born into societies that at first expected them to follow the paths of their fathers before dropping them when they decided to choose their own futures. 

So, it is fair to say that friendships became increasingly important in the absence of loving parents over the years until the current day for those who decided to succeed in life despite all challenges. But while the movie “Rich and Famous” follows the lives of two college friends, Liz Hamilton (played by Jacqueline Bisset) and Merry Noel Blake (played by Candice Bergen), who navigate their careers and personal lives from the 1950s to the 1980s, friends in real life quite often come and go unexpectedly.

I chose to write this article since Building Bridges is all about connecting people and opening the door for new friendships. When I look back at the last thirty years or so, I notice that a surprisingly high number of friends decided to stick around and didn’t vanish in the background. But how can it be that friendships continue even when someone moves away and leaves the country or the continent behind?

When I look at the strongest friendships in my life, the interesting thing is that most of us came from different backgrounds and met by chance. I used to live in Germany, in London, and in New York, and nowadays in Barcelona. I spent longer periods of time in South and Central America, where both of my children were born, and just like that 17-year-old farm boy from the 1990’s, I was hoping to find friendships at those places.

I felt that whenever I left the party scene there, the party continued without me, but then there were those encounters, which happened by chance and came with the instant feeling that we would get on well in life. I remember meeting some of my best friends on our last day at Baruch College back in 2010, or at the fashion label Tascani in Buenos Aires in 2013, or on a playground in Hannover in 2024.

Our paths crossed by chance; we connected right away, exchanged numbers, and stayed in contact. We supported each other from the beginning, experienced starting families, and made sure that our children got to know each other. I remember when Gonzalo from Argentina became my son's godfather and attended his baptism online. Years later my kids took off with him and his family for a sleepover at their home in Buenos Aires, making new memories and friendships on their own in Buenos Aires.

I also remember being an MBA student in London or a new parent in New York City when I was surrounded by other students from wealthy families or polished parents, who probably knew better than me what they were doing. But even at those places, where I didn’t fit in right away, I found friendships that were defined by a good sense of humor, the ability not to take ourselves too seriously and having a laugh, even when things weren't going according to expectations, and of course, respect and loyalty.

Friendships, which were impacted by jealousy, usually didn’t last long. I remember being surrounded by people with more successful careers and money and bigger homes, which never affected me or my own children. However, I also remember certain friends helping us out when money was tight or even saving a trip to Europe back in 2016, without asking any questions and having trust instead that they would get repaid.

And then there are those so-called friends who are trying to hold someone back and who keep telling others not to move countries, not to start families, and not to sign up for doctoral programs offered by Edinburgh Business School. I learned with time not to listen to them and to follow my dreams. However, it can take a lifetime to understand their motives, which are not always in someone’s best favor.

But what is the relevance of friendships some thirty years later after we started our own families with children, who will demand most of our attention for the next twenty years or so? Well, quite often life doesn’t go according to plan; marriages and parenthood might not turn out to be exact walks in the park, and moving countries and hoping for better lives could turn into major challenges or even disappointments.

When my children and I ended up in Hannover in 2024 and wondered how we turned up there, my friends from Building Bridges were really the ones who inspired and continued to be there for us. They helped me through a rather difficult time, and the things with the countries or oceans and being apart from us didn’t matter at all.

So some thirty years later, I have honestly found the friendships in my life, which I was hoping for when the movie “Rich and Famous” first came out, and that it didn’t matter if some of us became richer or more famous than others.

However, I want to add that especially in those turbulent and challenging times, we shouldn’t take our friends for granted. I look forward to meeting some of my dear friends in person on both sides of the Atlantic again in 2026.

Please don't hesitate to drop me a line if you are interested in joining our next event on February 8th, 2026, and let me wish you all a lovely weekend and, obviously, a wonderful and happy new year 2026.