LEONCE UND LENA

And you, Prince, are a book without letters,
with nothing but dashes.

Leonce from the kingdom of Popo has everything a prince could wish for. However, as a driven man in his oversaturated world, he only finds pleasure in spitting on stones, ending his relationship with his mistress Rosetta and suffering as a result. Only when his father King Peter tells him that he wants to marry Leonce to Princess Lena from the kingdom of Pipi, a complete stranger to him, does he take the initiative. He flees to Italy with the shrewd and work-shy servant Valerio. Is it coincidence or is it fate - he meets his intended wife there with her governess, who has not been given the easiest of tasks with Lena. Leonce falls madly in love. Overwhelmed by so much emotion, he decides to go to extremes.
Meanwhile, the borderline absolutist King Peter prepares his state for the forced wedding, naturally with a great deal of class: after all, "Vivat" is Latin! Will Peter prevail and the tiny kingdoms of Pipi and Popo be united, or will the children continue to resist?

In his comedy published in 1836, Georg Büchner paints a picture of a degenerate aristocratic society that every ordinary person could understand just as well as his slogan "Peace to the huts, war to the palaces". Using the means of parody and satire, he not only undermined censorship, he also dissected the insanity and imbecility of a ruling bureaucracy, which has become part of the German DNA, just like obedience to authority - Leonce and Lena still makes us laugh heartily today at pomp, authoritarianism and pomp.