It took until the twenty-first century for the extraordinary story of Hans Litten to reach the public at large. In 1930, stormtroopers attacked the patrons of Eden Dance Palace in Berlin. The victims hired Litten to prosecute their case and yes, he subpoenaed Adolf Hitler.
Details vary depending on the account, but some say that the Nazis broke up a meeting of migrant workers, and killed several of them, then claimed self-defense, saying they were attacked first.
Uniformed thugs attacking migrants and claiming self-defense? The connection to recent events is unavoidable and chilling. There is so much that is compelling about this story, and about Hans Litten himself, that one wishes “Hans Litten: The Jew Who Cross-Examined Hitler” were a less obvious and clunky play.
Hans (Daniel Yaiullo), an erudite intellectual whose favorite past-times are listening to Mozart, quoting Kant and reciting the poetry of Rilke, had devoted much of his time as a lawyer to defending members of the Communist Party, not because he was himself a Communist but because “I am defending the weak against the strong,” as he tells his mother Irmgard (Barbara McCulloh, the only woman in the nine-member cast.) This is why, according to the play, the leftist victims of the Eden Dance Palace attack had asked Hans and his law partner to serve as their private prosecutors (German law, we are told, allows victims to hire attorneys to question witnesses and the accused.) Hans’ strategy in the 1931 trial is to prove that the storm troopers entered the bar to make trouble. The way to prove that is to show that “violence is an ongoing Nazi policy,” despite the effort at the time by the future Fuhrer to pretend to disavow violence while he schemed his way into power. Hence Hans’ decision to put Hitler on the stand – which Hans hoped would also expose Hitler, and turn the German public against him before it was too late.
Although no transcript of the trial exists, Playwright Douglas Lackey does a decent job re-creating the exchange between Hans and Hitler (a credible Zack Calhoun). A sample:
Hans: ..the person who hits first, who provokes a response, cannot claim self-defense against that response. The question remains whether these storm troopers provoked the violence against which you say they defended themselves. Do you know that they did not provoke violence?
Hitler: If they did, they will be expelled from the party.
Hans: Has anyone in the Nazi party ever been expelled for provoking violence? Can you provide the court with an example?
Hitler: I cannot remember anyone at the moment.
Hans: So your party members have maintained perfect discipline in all cases. No one has ever been expelled for using violence?
Hitler: Our party prizes discipline.
Hans: The SA, your storm troopers, never act violently? What do they do then?
Hitler: Their main activities are calisthenics and gymnastics. You can observe this for yourself.
Hans: I am afraid to, Herr Hitler. Apparently passers-by can be wounded by these calisthenics.
This provokes laughter; the lawyer’s mockery of the Nazi leader enrages Hitler far more than losing the case – and makes Hans Litten one of Hitler’s first targets when he gains power.
It’s somewhat baffling that the trial takes up only about twenty minutes of a play that runs two hours (including intermission.) The playwright, who is also a professor of philosophy, fills the rest of the play with biographical scenes, philosophical and political debates, some dozen songs and poems from the period, and lots of scenes of post-trial Hans in prison and concentration camps, during which he shows up for visits with his mother exhibiting the latest injuries from his various tortures (These were early iterations of the camps, but did they really allow family visits?) All of this material outside of the trial might have worked better if it was presented with more subtlety and subtext. For all the playwright’s effort at indicating Hans’ “inner life” (as he informs us in a program note), Lackey’s writing is too often on the level of a school play, all spelled out and on the surface.
This is evident in the blunt title, and from the very first scene. The play begins with father Friedrich (Stan Buturla) interrogating his 21-year-old son Hans about what profession he will choose; he goes one by one (the ministry, medicine, the army) and Hans rejects them all glibly (eg “I am allergic to formaldehyde”) and tells him he wants to study art history
“Art history is difficult. You need lots of languages.
I am proficient in German, English, French, Italian, Greek, Latin, Hebrew, and Sanskrit.
“You are fluent in eight languages?” Friedrich says, surprised.
“Well, I’m not fluent in Sanskrit. Seven languages are not enough?”
They finally land on law – which is his father’s profession. The entire exchange is meant to be entertaining, but why doesn’t his father know what languages his son speaks?
Still, there are moments throughout the play that strike depressingly close to home, such as Hans ‘ attitude early toward the would-be authoritarian early on, before he realizes how dangerous he is: “The ranting, the raving. He’s a clown. He’s not electable. Look at his party platform. Abolish interest incomes…Seize foreign colonies…”
The public doesn’t care about what he says he’ll do, Hans law partner points out. “They say it’s just words to get votes.”
Hans Litten: The Jew Who Cross-Examined Hitler
Philosophy Productions at Theater Row through February 22
Running time: Two hours, including intermission
Tickets: $45 to $55
Written by Douglas Lackey
Directed by Alexander Harrington
Scenic design by Alex Roe, costume design by Anthony Paul-Cavaretta, lighting design by Alexander Bartenieff
Cast: Daniel Yaiullo as Hans Littten, Stan Buturla as Friedrich, prisoner, Zack Calhoun as Hitler, prisoner, Robert Ierardi as Konrad Jung and more, Whit K. Lee as Weill, judge and more, Barbara McCulloh as Irmgard, Dave Stishan as Barbasch and more, Marco Torriani as Brecht, judge and more, and Mark Eugene Vaughn as Chief Judge, Clifford Lord Allen and prisoner.
