I Am My Own Wife is the true story of the mysterious Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, born Lothar Berfelde, a German transvestite and a true eccentric. The one-man play—in which a single actor portrays nearly three dozen different characters—won the Pulitzer Prize, a Tony Award for Best Play, and numerous other awards.
As the play opens, American journalist John Marks comes across Charlotte von Mahlsdorf’s story and passes it along to his friend Doug Wright, a playwright. Wright, intrigued by the story of an East Berlin transvestite who managed to survive the repressive regimes of both the Nazis and the Communists, raises the money to travel to Germany and interviews Charlotte in 1993.
In the course of his visits, Wright uncovers an incredible story. Von Mahlsdorf has spent a lifetime preserving artifacts from die Gründerzeit, the period in Germany between 1890 and 1900, items that other regimes had discarded, devalued or destroyed. She buys, barters and lovingly cares for these rare bits of forgotten history in her museum-like home. Among her accomplishments, she completely disassembles The Mulack-Ritze, a Cabaret Bar favored by Marlene Dietrich and Bertolt Brecht, and painstakingly hauls it all for miles, bit by bit, in a cart, reassembling it in her cellar, where she welcomes the gay community, banned by the Communists. She was later awarded a Medal of Honor for preserving the cabaret.
Yet, as the play progresses, Wright finds von Mahlsdorf’s personal history even more shocking. She tells Wright that her mother was cruelly abused by her father and, fearing for her own life, she shoots and kills him. Through guile and a series of astonishing coincidences, she escapes danger again and again.
As his research deepens, another remarkable twist confronts Wright: Records show that von Mahlsdorf may have served as an informant for the dreaded East German secret police. Two worlds collide as the playwright desperately tries to reconcile these records with von Mahlsdorf’s own tale. Was she truly an informant? Did her information lead to the imprisonment of her friend and fellow collector Alfred Kirschner, who languishes in prison, destitute and sick? If so, what were her motives? Did her black-market dealings force her to turn him in for self-protection, or did she simply want to get her hands on Kirschner’s own collection of artifacts? Charlotte’s death in 2002 only deepens the mystery.
Co-Director Brooke Ciardelli and actor Kevin Loreque traveled to East Berlin in September, 2006 to explore von Mahlsdorf’s history, to view the important places in her life, including her home and museum. The trip provided priceless background for the Northern Stage production, which brings to life this incredible story of heroism and deception.
