From left: Claire Fraenkel, David Leopold, Joseph Cullen, Sasha Wilson, and Lawrence Boothman star in The Brief Life & Mysterious Death of Boris III, King of Bulgaria, a look at the little-known monarch who stood up to Hitler.
Near the end of the Barry Manilow musical Harmony, the surviving Comedian Harmonist Ari Leschnikoff, “a Bulgarian singing waiter” who survived the Holocaust to return to his home country, brags to a rabbi: “We saved them, Rabbi! Every Jewish person in Bulgaria! We wouldn’t let them have them! Not one!” This startling declaration, which demanded elaboration, is the foundation of The Brief Life & Mysterious Death of Boris III, King of Bulgaria. The story of Boris III might have remained a historical footnote but for Sasha Wilson, the cowriter of the piece (with Joseph Cullen), whose grandparents escaped Bulgaria during World War II. It turns out that the history of Bulgaria in the 20th century is far more complicated than the Harmony passage suggests.
Wilson plays Theodor Dannecker, Hitler’s ruthless emissary to Bulgaria, who is determined to deport the country’s Jews, as Leopold listens in.
Directed by Hannah Hauer-King, Boris III is a strange beast. It’s a goulash of historical data, metatheatrical comments, and brief audience interactions that are often delivered with a burlesque sensibility. After Germany invades Russia, which had been regarded as an ally, Bulgaria’s highest-ranking Nazi, Theodor Dannecker (a stony, indomitable Wilson) delivers a smirky pun: “No one is ‘Russian’ to help you.” She might be Natasha Fatale from Rocky and Bullwinkle.
Luckily, the jarring low comedy and the swirl of facts don’t impede the storytelling. Boris III, one learns, wasn’t actually Bulgarian. After centuries of Ottoman domination, the country regained its freedom in the 19th century, whereupon the Bulgarians “realized they wanted to be ruled by a king again, as in the golden days of yore.” As Boris chimes in, “Somebody’s got to be on the stamp!” But there had been no royal family for 500 years, so in 1886 a delegation searched throughout Europe for a monarch, and they found Ferdinand of the duchy of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. His relatives included Louis Philippe, France’s last king; Queen Victoria; and Tsar Nicholas II. Although Ferdinand loved his adopted country, he allied it with Germany in World War I. After choosing the losing side, he abdicated in 1918 and exiled himself, leaving his throne to 24-year-old Boris.
Fraenkel (with Leopold at rear) plays a Jewish musician in the court of Boris III. Photographs by Carol Rosegg.
But that’s all a prelude, delivered swiftly and cogently by the cast, albeit interspersed with hoary gags. When the government mulls finding a large, powerful country that will protect it during World War II, the mention of Turkey as a possible ally results in the cast turning and spitting in unison: “Ptui!” When the litany of Boris’s names recited at his coronation includes “Maria,” the joke echoes Rodgers & Hammerstein’s “The Prince Is Giving a Ball” from Cinderella (1957), where “Herman” gets the laugh.
Cullen brings out Boris’s fecklessness and timidity, but also his determination to serve his people and find a protector to help regain the lands that Ferdinand ceded. Though Boris settles on Germany, which he thinks he can outwit, he’s undermined by his prime minister, Bogdan Filov, played with weaselly aplomb by Lawrence Boothman. A ruthless nationalist—“A new world is being born, restrictions will be imposed on anything that is alien to our nation”—Filov is assisted first by Petar Gabrovski (Clare Fraenkel), a homegrown Nazi, and then by David Leopold’s Alexander Belev, a hulking thug with reputed Hebrew ancestry. But even with the growing Nazi threat, the humor can evoke the Three Stooges or Hogan’s Heroes:
Belev: I have just returned from THE REICH.
Boris: Gesundheit.
The story moves swiftly through the early war years, and Boris’s role—a puppet of the Nazis or a shrewd hero for his people?—becomes a bit muddled. He gives speeches excoriating “Jewish profiteering,” yet he also thwarts the deportation of thousands of Jews. But his balancing act results in one notable failure: he cannot save one shipment of deportees—11,343 Jews from Macedonia and Thrace, those regions that Bulgaria hopes to regain. They are sent to Treblinka, and only 12 survive.
Bogdan Filov (Lawrence Boothman, left) and Alexander Belev (David Leopold) are two Nazi-sympathizing advisers who try to sabotage King Boris III.
Finally, Hitler demands a face-to-face confrontation with Boris in Berlin, where, on Aug. 9, 1943, they had a private, unrecorded meeting. Less than a week later, Boris was suddenly stricken ill and died. Rumors of “a typical Balkan death” (poison) were never confirmed, and Boris’s 6-year-old son became Tsar Simeon II (he is now 86). Suspicion fell not only on Hitler but also on the Soviets and the Italians—but thereafter Hitler kept his hands off Bulgaria’s Jews.
As a piece of theater, Boris III succeeds on the strength of its personable and talented performers, most of whom play instruments (guitar, mandolin, flute and violin). And despite the unusual infusion of low comedy into the direst events, the offbeat history lesson is often enthralling.
The Brief Life & Mysterious Death of Boris III, King of Bulgaria runs through June 2 at 59E59 Theaters (59 E. 59th St.). Evening performances are at 7 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; matinees are at 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. For tickets and more information, visit 59e59.org.
Playwrights: Sasha Wilson & Joseph Cullen
Director & Dramaturg: Hannah Hauer-King
Lighting Designer: Will Alder
Set Designer: Sorcha Corcoran
Costume Designer: Helen Stewart
