About the play

A comedy play from the 19th century about a shifty small-town judge who has molested a young woman and in the process broke a jug – isn’t that dry as dust and hopelessly antiquated? Not at all, says our theatre group and enthusiastically sets about staging the play. It’s going to be one mega jug show, with music and everything – all very contemporary! And yet, it’s not just a certain clay vessel that is cracked: soon cracks are also starting to show among the group working on the play. Who is actually in charge here? Who decides about who plays which role? Why do they allow ensemble leader BO to bully them around? And why is LIWO refusing to play Eve?

Increasingly, layers are starting to blur and unsettling parallels emerge between the original play and the ensemble performing it. Warning: there’s threat, flattery, bribery and dishonesty in spades. In a mindblowing mix of Kleist’s German and modern-day parlance, Jug.Broken! shows that people like judge Adam can also be found in today’s executive boardrooms – as long as we continue to believe them.