Tales from Hollywood at Guthrie Theater

Lights! Camera! Aktion! Where did German writers and other artists go when they escaped the rise of the Third Reich? To Hollywood, of course. Hampton mines the oddness of German intellectuals in Tinseltown for both humor and humanity. Featuring theater pioneer Bertolt Brecht and novelists Thomas and Heinrich Mann, Tales from Hollywood is narrated by Ödön von Horváth, a real-life Eastern European playwright. Horváth (who in reality died before the events of the play when he was hit on the head by a tree branch in Paris) is our guide through the story – of writers who barely speak English being asked to write a sequel to Bedtime for Bonzo, of émigrés struggling with their new home and all that infernal California sunshine, of exiles trying to forget old demons and reconcile choices they’ve made in the past. Featuring a large ensemble cast, Tales from Hollywood is Hampton’s favorite play and often considered his best. Winner of the Evening Standard Award for Best Comedy.