Climène – a provincial woman who abhors the countryside – is staying at an inn in Paris, to keep her father company while he is being kept in the city for a trial. Together with her servant Laurette and two of her friends, the Marquis and Timante, they make fun of the way the other characters speak. They all attend a puppet show, comment on it, and are chided by the puppet Pantalon.

Not specified

Poisson Raymond (aka Belleroche)

France

Paris

Printed

Very young girl's marriage

Provincial life

Talking nonsense

Comical

French

ou les Marionnettes

Marquis

Vicomtess

Gascon

Normand

Flemish

Brisefer

Innkeeper

Fanchon

Pantaloon

Inn scene

Comical foreign accent

Comical regional accent

Puppet theatre within the theatre

L'Après-souper des auberges

The After-supper at the inns

A Marchande (female merchant), in love with an employee of the shop (the Courtaud (Shorty)), believes that he is interested in her daughter. A Servante (female servant) arouses the jealousy of a Laquais (male servant). A drunk Musicien (male Musician) tells a Suisse (Swiss man) that his wife is unfaithful to him. Polichinelle tries to seduce a Grisette (Shop girl), meets a Peintre (male painter) who wanted to paint his portrait, and then joins a Troupe de Buveurs (a Group of Drinkers): they dance a divertissement and sing a vaudeville at the end of the play.

Rod and string marionette

Love

Seduction

Unfaithfulness

Drunkenness

Wine

Cabaret

Valet

Satirical

First page of the manuscript of Polichinelle à la guinguette de Vaugirard.

Merchant (woman)

Shop employee

Maid

Swiss

Musician

Polichinelle

Grisette

Painter

Play with drawers

Love story

Final song

Dancing entertainment

Conversation

Aria

Polichinelle à la guinguette de Vaugirard

Polichinelle at the guinguette of Vaugirard

The governor of Barcelona, Don Pietro, banishes Don Juan on behalf of the king of Spain, and he refuses to let him marry his daughter – whom he offers to his rival Don Philippo. Jealous, Don Juan tries to abduct Donna Marillis just as Don Philippo is about to take her to a ball – since it is carnival time. However, he is caught by Don Pietro, kills him and then flees with his servant Hans Wurst. In the woods, they meet a hermit whom Don Juan kills in order to steal his trousers. Thus disguised, he also murders Don Philippo, who went after him. The two fugitives reach a first inn, then a second one, where Don Juan invites the statue of Don Pietro, which is standing not far. When Don Pietro’s ghost arrives, Don Juan and Hans Wurst are already eating the salad. The statue summons its murderer at midnight, in the cemetery, and hands out its hand to take him to Hell.

Germany

Augsburg

Seducer

Unwelcome seducer

Assassination

Murder

Serial murder

Phantom

Revenant

Servant

Morality

Aristocracy

Nobility

Spain

Carnival

German

Augsburger Don Juan-Spiel

Don Juan

Don Pietro

Don Filippo

Hanswurst

Donna Marillis

Lipperl

Devil

Guard

Hermit

Landlady

Statue

Ghost

Apparition

Final intervention of the devil

Letter

Disguise

Murder on stage

Apparition of the Devil

Bawdy equivocation

Don Juan und Don Pietro, oder das Steinerne-Todten-Gastmahl

Don Juan and Don Pietro, or the gruesome Feast of stone

The tailor Hanswurst is trying to become a spy to arrest the infamous outlaw Schinderhannes. However, he ends up becoming part of the band of outlaws and helps his partners break into the town, which they plunder. Outlaws relate that they have robbed Jewish shopkeepers. Military officials begin to chase Schinderhannes; fights break out. Schinderhannes runs away with his lover Julie. He repents his crimes and protects his future bride, who is crossing the woods with a dowry of 300 Gulden. He even kills an outlaw from his own band to punish him for gratuitous violent acts. Hanswurst is arrested by a French constable for having stolen a farmer’s pigs. Their difficulty to communicate, as they speak two different languages, leads to many amusing misunderstandings. Hanswurst manages to flee and then betrays his leader, who is finally caught by the soldiers.

String marionette

Trained animal

Geisselbrecht Johann Georg

Frankfurt

Manuscript

Robber

Antisemitism

Nationalism

Failure of language

Dramatic

Der große Räuber am Rhein

Julie Blasius

Mayor

Peasant (female)

Peasant (man)

Porcher

Constable

Recruiter

Tailor

Address to the public

Monologue

Song

Misunderstanding

Entering with vehicle

Schinderhannes

Cassandro, a merchant of about fifty years old, is in need of money: he has finally decided to marry, partly to benefit from his wife’s dowry. He must go from Rome to Albano for this wedding with a woman whom he does not know. He leaves with Rocco, his apprentice, on a donkey. On the way, Cassandro stops at a famous inn in which many Romans meet, eat, drink and sing some sorts of stornelli in verse. Cassandro and Rocco then set out again to meet the bride. A storm breaks out during the trip: the donkey stumbles, Cassandro falls, and Rocco and the innkeeper who has come to help him both think that he is dead. While the two men are busy taking care of the donkey, Cassandro comes round; but he pretends to be dead to see what will happen. The fiancée arrives with her brother and mother. They also believe that Cassandro is dead, but they need to pretend that he is alive to make him sign the marriage agreement and take his money. Thus, they drag the so-called corpse and arrange it so that it can be at the wedding and stand before the notary, whose sight is bad. They change the contract so that the two parties can fully enjoy the other’s possessions. However, Cassandro “comes back to life” when it is time to sign it. The wedding still happens: although the young bride is blind in one eye and not pretty, Cassandro reaps economic benefits from it and the bride’s parents must make the best of it. The friends from the inn join in the celebration.

All audiences

Giraud Giovanni

Italy

Rome

Wedding

Journey

Death

Contract

Money

Giovanni Giraud, Opere edite e inedite, 1842.

Italian

Shopkeeper

Fiancé

Cassandre

Sister

Apprentice

Fiancée

Mother

Brother

Notary

Coachman

Poet

Music

Fall of a character

Fake death

Il viaggio sull'asino di Cassandro sposo

The trip on the donkey of Cassandro, husband

Don Juan tries to blindside his rival Don Philippo by abducting Donna Amarillis during the night. But he is caught by her father – the governor of Seville Don Pietro – whom he kills in a duel. Then he tries in vain to borrow money to an old cousin (or to his own father, whom he eventually murders in the second version). When he mentions selling his soul, Hans Wurst wants to help him out by making the devil appear thanks to a formula he learnt from a magician. However, Don Juan mocks the devil and Hans Wurst is swept into the air on a giant sausage – thankfully, he lands at the inn where his master was waiting for him. After a shipwreck, the two men reunite in a wood near Seville. There, they also meet a hermit and Don Juan forces him to give him his clothes. Don Philippo arrives and drives them out of the woods. Don Juan stabs him and leaves him for dead. Then he attempts another time to seduce a shepherdess and Donna Amarillis, who also went hunting. Don Philippo’s men are still after Don Juan and Hans Wurst, who manage to get to an inn near the church’s cemetery. Don Juan invites the statue of the governor Don Pietro for dinner, then agrees to follow his guest into the vault, where he dies in the pains of hell. As for Hans Wurst, he marries the manager of the inn.

Dresden

Gangster

Parricide

Religion

Abduction

Don Juan, der vierfache Mörder, oder das Gastmahl um Mitternacht auf dem Kirchhofe

Der steinerne Gast

Pantolfius

Court usher

Hunter

Fury

Metamorphosis

Lazzi

The tailor Bock lodges a complaint with the mayor Salzmaier against Kasperl, his tenant, for night-time disturbances. Salzmaier wants to put him in prison, but Kasperl, warned by his clerk friend Spritzler, pretends to be Garibaldi, entering the Tyrol leading 50,000 men. He takes up residence in Salzmaier's house, flirts with his wife Margarethe and drinks so much beer... that everyone recognises him: the play ends with a general brawl.

Young audiences

Pocci Franz von

Munich

Excessive drinking

Beer

Spousal abuse

Army

Burlesque

Ein politisches Trauerspiel, aus dem Italienischen übersetzt

Clerk

Kasperl

Madame Kasperl

In der Ferne das Garibaldische Armeekorps

Political allegory

Parody of formal language

Word for another

Dialect

Macaronism

Brawl

Kasperl als Garibaldi

Kasperl as Garibaldi

The English Marquis leaves the strongbox in which he keeps his wife’s jewellery with the Innkeeper. The brigand Fradiavolo witnesses this and tells his men. At nightfall, the robbers break into the inn to steal the strongbox. But as they hear Cerline’s (the innkeeper’s daughter) prayer, they hesitate. At that moment, Robert – Cerline’s fiancé – arrives at the inn with his own men. The robbers decide to postpone the theft. The following night, the drunken robbers sing Cerline’s prayer. Their plan is thus exposed. Robert is warned by Cerline and manages to arrest the robbers, among which was Fradiavolo.

Lille

Handwritten outline

Casette

Tourism

Theft

Arrest

Jewel

Prayer

Sergeant

Knight

English man

Frà Diavolo

Night scene

Improvised dialogue

La Capture du fameux Fradiavolo

The Capture of the famous Fradiavolo

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.

Marionettenspiel um einen Münchner Finanzskandal im Jahre 1873

Adele Spitzeder