Synopsis

Moscow, 1573
Berlin, 1942

This darkly comedic and provocative play juxtaposes two starkly contrasting historical settings to examine the absurdities and horrors of human cruelty. The first act is set in 1575 in a courtyard outside a Moscow chapel, where Ivan Moskovsky, an abbot of the Russian Orthodox Church, oversees the brutal torture of Prince Nikita Odoevsky. This act delves into themes of suffering, divine punishment, and the grotesque nature of religious fanaticism. The second act shifts to a sterile office in Berlin, 1942, where Viktor Cranach and his colleagues manage the logistics of the Holocaust with chilling detachment. This setting starkly contrasts with the visceral brutality of the first act, highlighting the banality of evil and the bureaucratic efficiency behind mass murder.

The play explores themes of suffering, divine punishment, bureaucracy and dehumanisation, and moral and ethical dilemmas. Barnes uses sharp, satirical dialogue to expose the grotesque realities and moral failures of these two historical periods. The tone is both darkly humorous and deeply unsettling, reflecting the playwright’s critical view of institutionalised cruelty and the human capacity for inhumanity.