Tags: Hitler Youth

Face Forward: Growing up in Nazi Germany

An interview-based play about adolescence in Nazi Germany. Three young people struggle to claim their identities and transition into adulthood in this play about ethics, family, and self-perception. Marian's father wants to hide a Jewish family, but Marian just wants to fit in. Ernst joins the Hitler Youth but has trouble fully embracing the lifestyle. Rebecca endures discrimination from teachers and students for her Jewish heritage. No answers come easily as these three characters experience ordinary growing pains in the face of extraordinary historical tragedy.

Goodbye Marianne

Based on the playwright’s experience as a child in Nazi Germany immediately after Kristallnacht, 1938. Marianne finds one day that she is no longer permitted to attend school. She meets Ernst, a boy staying in her apartment building while on holiday in Berlin. She finds out he is a member of the Hitler Youth and Ernst realizes that Marianne is Jewish. They argue and she fears their friendship is over. Marianne’s father is in hiding from the Gestapo, and her mother tries to protect her from the reality of their circumstances. Through Kindertransport, Marianne is able to escape to Canada. Before she leaves, Ernst gives her a gift, which renews her faith in humanity and gives her hope for the future.

Hitler’s Li’l Abomination

A semiautobiographical solo play by playwright Annette Roman that explores her unusual childhood—her father was a Hungarian Holocaust survivor and her mother was a former member of Bund Deutsche Model (Hitler Youth for girls). The play explores the idiosyncrasies of her upbringing. Her father would recount bedtime stories about the Holocaust, while she remembers seeing her aunt use a swastika-adorned kitchen knife. A unique look at the emotional impact of WWII on those involved.

The Informer

Set in the living room of a middle class family on a Sunday afternoon in the late 1930s, Brecht describes his play as “a dramatic sketch of family life as it is today in the new Hiter’s Germany.” A teacher and his wife are terrified that their son, a member of the Hitler Youth, will turn them in for their negative statements about the Nazism. They are even fearful that their maid, also a committed Nazi, will inform on them. The teacher attempts to find ways to make his actions more politically acceptable.