Don Juan has asked his servant Kasperl to sell his last shirt and coat, but Kasperl has spent the money from the sale on beers. He sends him to borrow money from his father, the knight Pantolfius. When Pantolfius refuses, Don Juan himself comes to ask him to comply, but in vain, and Kasperl kicks him in the nose. To find money, Kasperl then has the idea of summoning the devil, but when Don Juan wants to sell him his soul, he replies that it already belongs to him and takes it to hell.

Not specified

Reinhardt Carl

Germany

Munich

Printed

Tralala

Excessive drinking

Drunkard

Drinking

Credit

Father

Perlicke

Money

Debt

Hits

Radirullala

Demon

Damnation

Satirical

Parodistic

Grotesque

Farce

German

Don Juan

Pantolfius

Kasperl

Devil

Final intervention of the devil

Spectacular turn of events

Song

Pact with the devil

Kasperl und Don Juan

Kasperl and Don Juan

The rich Niflanguille goes to buy a bag of coal. He comes across the hungry Pierrot, who asks for his help in vain. The coalman cheats Niflanguille out of the weight of the bag. Pierrot hides in the bag and beats up the coalman, Niflanguille and the servant. Back home, Niflanguille looks for a sword to pierce the recalcitrant bag, but Pierrot gets it out in time and forces the servant to take his place. While Niflanguille pierces the bag and his servant with it, Pierrot runs away with a bag of money. A Gendarme wants to hang Niflanguille for murder, Pierrot for theft and the coalman for swindling. Pierrot kills the Gendarme and puts him in the sack, which he throws away, while Niflanguille flees through the window. Pierrot kills the coalman to avoid sharing the money, then orders wine which he pays for by beating the innkeeper with a stick. The Commissaire arrives with Niflanguille; he hangs Pierrot, but confiscates the money to punish the bad rich man.

Glove-puppet

All audiences

France

Paris

Duranty Louis Émile Edmond

Charcoal

Hunger

Poverty

Swindling

Trade

Deception

Contempt

Punishment

Hanging

Bad rich

Didactic

French

Pierrot

Niflanguille

Le Charbonnier

Domestique

Le Gendarme

Le Commissaire

Hidden character

Running gag

Blow-with-a-stick

Hanging scene

Le Sac de charbon

The Bag of Coal

Fleeing his wife, Polichinelle steals a charlatan's cabriolet with Pierrot. First he wins the trust of the population with free advice, then he launches a subscription for a phantom financial company. When the shareholders demand their money, he sends them away with good words and blows, until the Public itself comes to threaten him directly. Mrs. Polichinelle offers to take care of the punishment. Terrified, Polichinelle flees into the forest. Abandoned by Pierrot, he walks to Hell. There, he tries to swindle Death and stands up to the Devil who, in desperation, goes looking for Mrs. Polichinelle. She brings her husband home firmly, with the approval of the audience.

Finance

Hell

Marriage hell

Forest

Public

Perseverance in Evil

Satire of Capitalism

Bossy woman

Escape

Comical

Ironic

Le Charlatan

Polichinelle

Le Locataire

La Dame

Le Paysan

Cassandre

Le Boutiquier

Colombine

Valet

La Mort

Intervention of the audience

Devil's apparition

Plot twist

L'Homme au cabriolet

the man with a cabriolet

A wealthy baker chef asks his cousin the apothecary to help him poison Pierrot, who is constantly robbing and assaulting him. When this plan fails, he sends his dog after the thief, but Pierrot kills the dog. Knowing that Pierrot has always wanted to learn pastry-making, the baker pretends to take him on as an apprentice to get revenge. But Pierrot plays many tricks. The gendarme, who has come to arrest him, is swindled, then hanged in the villain's place. Pierrot kills the baker and the apothecary, as a worthy disciple of Polichinelle.

Pastry

Stealing

Wickedness

Poison

Learning

Revenge

Criminal

Cruelty

Cruelty to an animal

Death of the dog

Fighting an animal

Le Pâtissier

L'Apothicaire

Le Chien

Headbutt

Fight with an animal

Lazzi

Back Stroke

Pierrot et le pâtissier

Pierrot and the baker

Catalysterium, a fake doctor, breaks into the Niflanguille's house and diagnoses the couple and their servant with a supposedly fatal disease. He asks them to stay in bed, eats their food and prescribes very expensive medicines (in fact water) to rob them. Mr. Niflanguille finds out about the scam and gets his money back. Cataclysterium is beaten by the Niflanguille and their servant and forced to take an oath to give up medicine forever.

False doctor

Medicine

Illness

Health

Medicines

Brandy

Swindler

Satire of medicine

Parody of medical language

Syringe

Chase

Les Drogues de Cataclysterium

Cataclysterium's Drugs

While all poor people on the outskirts of Munich deposit their savings in Adele Spitzeder's bank, sometimes even selling their businesses to live on their income, Kasperl is looking for a job. Through his brother Baldhauser (also known as Baldes), a door-to-door salesman, he was placed as a doorman at Adele Spitzeder's house. He introduces the bank's customers to the bank office, where she receives them with her proverbial frankness. But at the end of his first day on the job, the police come and arrest the banker for fraud and close the place down: Kasperl beats down the poor people who come to claim their money. The fourth act or epilogue is a picture of country life: following a quarrel with his wife, Kasperl's other brother, Melchior, goes drinking with the town crier. Kasperl and Baldes enter the stage to conclude the play with a song.

String marionette

Gailler Gabriel

Scandal

Stock exchange

Bank

Embezzlement

Bavaria

Beer

Politics

Society

Peasantry

Popular class

People

Misery

Bankruptcy

Marionettenspiel um einen Münchner Finanzskandal im Jahre 1873

Serveur

Berger

Police officer

Employé municipal

Flying machine

Inn scene

Catastrophe

Conversation

Political allegory

Slang

Argument

Dialect as a social marker

Caricature

Brawl

Adele Spitzeder

Don Juan overhears a conversation between Amarillis and Don Philippo, who agree to a romantic rendezvous. He sets out to kidnap Amarillis, when her father, Don Pietro, appears. Don Juan stabs him, and then robs his relative Don Alvaro Pantolfius, before fleeing Seville with his servant Schängche. The latter, tormented by a devil, is carried into the air on a giant sausage. After a shipwreck in which Schängche is swallowed and then spat out by a whale, the two fugitives wander through the woods. They meet a hermit, who, under threat, lends Don Juan a suit to disguise himself. Lost in the forest, Amarillis meets Schängche's fiancée, the innkeeper Greta de la Rosa. Don Juan finds the two women and tries to seduce them, but Don Philippo finds him in the meantime. Don Juan murders him. Schängche still has to fight a monster they meet in the forest. They arrive by chance at Greta's inn, where Don Juan seduces the bride of a wedding that has just taken place. At the cemetery, he invites the statue of Don Pietro to supper, who accepts his invitation. But Don Juan refuses to repent and is damned. Schängche, on the other hand, marries Greta.