Vosseler has long struggled to hold down a job, once even losing his job cleaning sewers. But now the 57 year old says he's found a "clean way to earn money," by moving into the hermetically sealed container of Big Brother, the reality television show that locks volunteers in a house and films their every move.

"Yes, that's true. I'll take a look at the goings-on in the house for a day. Maybe I'll stay a week or even longer, in any case, as long as I please," Vosseler told the newspaper Bild.

Big Brother candidates earn €250 ($300) a week.

Vosseler is not the first well-known person to do some time at Big Brother. The head of Germany's Liberal party, Guido Westerwelle, paid a visit, as did advertising diva Verona Feldbusch.

Vosseler's visit coincides with elections for the European Parliament and in one of Germany's federal states, where Schröder's own Social Democrats are expected to be punished by voters for the government's reform programs which include welfare cuts. Vosseler said he'll talk politics with the other shut-ins.

Vosseler and his own big brother Gerhard grew up together in Lower Saxony in the post-war years. Schröder never saw his father, who died in World War Two, but their mother married Vosseler's father after the war.