Mephisto

A Pact with the Devil

A play with music based on the novel by Klaus Mann

A production by the New Globe Theater

The (fictional) story of actor Hendrik Höfgen unfolds from 1926, when he works at the Hamburg Artists' Theatre, until 1936, when he becomes a star of the so-called Third Reich and is appointed intendant of the Berlin State Theatre.

Höfgen, who long resists compromising with the Nazi regime and openly clashes with his colleague Hans Miklas in the ensemble, initially flees to Paris. However, Lotte Lindenthal, wife of the "Air Force General" and Prime Minister, though herself a mediocre actress, desires Höfgen as her partner for her Berlin debut at the State Theatre and persuades her husband, "the Fat One", to bring Höfgen back to Berlin.

As a passionate actor for whom the role of Mephistopheles in Goethe's Faust seems tailor-made, the opportunist Höfgen realizes far too late that he has indeed made a pact with the devil. He will lose nearly everyone who matters to him during this fall into the moral abyss: his beloved Juliette, his wife Barbara, his communist friend Otto. Only the actress and kindred spirit Nicoletta will remain loyal to him-he entered into a marriage of convenience with her to escape persecution for his sexual orientation.

In the end, Hendrik becomes a "monkey of power", a "clown for the amusement of murderers". An actor torn between career and conscience. Culminating in the famous line:

"After all, I'm just an ordinary actor!"

The New Globe Theater presents "Mephisto" as a revue-a "dance on the volcano" in the distorted mirror of a 1920s-1930s political cabaret with live music and a master of ceremonies.