George Tabori – Viennese icon, theatre genius, cosmopolitan. His farce MEIN KAMPF (MY STRUGGLE) was one of the most influential plays of the 1980s. Tabori was among the first playwrights to rediscover Adolf Hitler as a humorous character – almost 50 years after Charlie Chaplin’s “The Great Dictator”. And he really put the “Führer” through the wringer: The play shows a young Hitler, a bumpkin from Braunau am Inn, still wet behind the ears and yet already showing signs of megalomania. With some decidedly average watercolour paintings in his bag, he is on his way to Vienna for the first time in his life, in hopes of being accepted to the Academy of Fine Arts. He stays at a men’s dormitory, where he shares a room with Lobkowitz, a kosher chef, and Shlomo Herzl, a book peddler. The two Jewish men have divided opinions on their new roommate. While Lobkowitz is skeptical of Hitler, Herzl takes him under his wing … 

Thirty-three years after its world premiere at the Akademietheater, which was directed by Tabori (1914–2007) himself, the Burgtheater is now presenting a new production of this seminal farce on its main stage. MEIN KAMPF is directed by Burgtheater ensemble member Italy Tiran, already known to audiences for his production of Wajdi Mouawad’s VÖGEL (ALL BIRDS) in the 2019/20 season.