The player at Nationaltheater Mannheim

In Casino Roulettenburg the rolling ball over riches or ruin, about the rise or demise decides. The retired general has fallen in love with Blanche, however, has only his inheritance in view. This has the indebted General urgently needed, because his entire estate has been pledged to the Marquis des Grieux. Also Polina, the stepdaughter of General is financially dependent on des Grieux and also connected in a complicated love-hate relationship with the tutor Alexei. While all speculate impatiently for the death of the rich great aunt from Moscow, this seems highly personal and playful within a short time of their assets. But Alexei did not put on the great-aunt, but on the roulette. To redeem Polina and to win them over, he starts to play. He gets deeper and deeper into the noise of the game and loses about Polina and finally himself.

In his 1867 novel, The Player Fyodor Dostoyevsky portrays the ambivalent mixture of fascination and threat posed to humans from the game. He knew from personal experience: For several years he taught by his passion for gambling again to the brink of existence. Sergei Prokofiev sets Dostoyevsky's text without the intermediate step of forming into a libretto directly into music. With its machine-like ostinato and its feverish energy his composition makes a perfect correspondence with Dostoevsky's obsession study.