Inquisition

Synopsis:

Rudolf Vrba (nee Walter Rosenberg), aged 19, was the first Jew to successfully escape from Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.  He did so, at enormous personal risk, in order to let the Jews of Hungary know that they were next on Hitler’s extermination list.

In order to get the message across, together with sufficient eye-witness evidence to convince those who found his account of the death camp incredible, he wrote a lengthy report and arranged to meet with Monsignor Mario Marlotti, the Papal envoy to Switzerland, in order to try and mobilise the Church.

Ultimately, his efforts helped save the lives of some 200,000 Hungarian Jews.

The play is an imagined account of his ‘inquisition’ at the hands of a disbelieving cleric, and it asks the uncomfortable question:  Why has Rudolf Vrba not been memorialised in the same fashion as, say, Oskar Schindler?

Character Breakdown:

The play is a 2-hander: 2 males.
RUDOLF VRBA  19
MONSIGNOR MARIO MARLOTTI  30s

Running-time:  75 minutes.

Production History:  Not yet produced.

Excerpt available for download for free.