The Kleist Variations: Three Plays

The plays are Concord, a comedy based on Kleist’s The Broken Jug; The Fall of the Amazons, a tragedy from the Kleist Penthesilea; and Wannsee, a tragicomedy, Bentley’s rendering of Das Katchen von Heilbronn.Concord is set in a courthouse during the early days of the Republic. Convened to discover who broke an irreplaceable jug symbolic of the chivalric age of Sir Walter Raleigh, Judge Adam’s madcap court flounders in hilarious chaos induced by comic lust.The Fall of the Amazons is the story of Achilles and the Amazon queen Penthesilea. In this pagan play, Bentley explores improbable love, a theme shared by Wannsee.Wannsee is a play of pageantry: emperors, counts, dueling knights, a young beauty of seemingly low birth, cherubs, and witches masked in loveliness.