The traditional New Year's Eve television sketch watched in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland is Dinner for One.
Dinner for One is a short English-language comedy sketch originally performed in British music halls. It features an elderly woman, Miss Sophie, celebrating her 90th birthday while her butler, James, impersonates four absent guests and drinks their toasts.
German television broadcast the sketch in 1963, and it became a recurring New Year's Eve program. The phrase “the same procedure as every year” became especially recognizable to German-speaking audiences. The program's popularity is unusual because the sketch was not a major British television tradition when it became famous in continental Europe.
The performance most commonly shown in Germany stars Freddie Frinton as James and May Warden as Miss Sophie. Versions and broadcasts differ slightly, but the central joke remains the butler repeatedly serving and drinking for guests who are not present. It is often paired with countdown programming and other holiday broadcasts.