Amphitryon

Amphitryon, "the doubly afflicted", the glorious general - sometimes he has a hard time with the world and it has a hard time with him. He was away for a long time. Where he really was and what he did remains his secret for the time being. But now he finally returns to Thebes, full of endless longing for Alkmene. But the hoped-for night of love comes to nothing. Alkmene rejects him, after all, he was only with her yesterday and more passionate than ever. Amphitryon no longer understands the world. And Alkmene also begins to doubt herself. Sosias and Charis, servants in Amphitryon's castle, feel the same way: something must have happened to each of them in the other's absence. Or is it the other way around? No question, the gods have a hand in it and nothing is as it seems...

What comes along in the guise of an ancient comedy of mistaken identity is so much more than a game of sexual confusion. In his tragicomic comedy, Heinrich von Kleist poses existential questions that preoccupied him throughout his life: What makes us who we are? Who can we trust if not ourselves? And what happens when this basic trust is suddenly called into question?

Director Milena Michalek, born in 1993, studied philosophy and founded the theater collective YZMA. She has already worked as an author and director in Vienna, Cottbus and Hanover, among other places. In 2020, she was invited to the Autor:innenTheaterTage at Deutsches Theater Berlin. She is now presenting "Amphitryon" at the D'haus and is approaching the play about identity and sexuality from a feminist perspective in her own adaptation with a keen awareness of Kleist's language.