Glücklich die Glücklichen marks the German-language premiere of Yasmina Reza's celebrated novel at the Berliner Ensemble. Directed by Oliver Reese, this production examines the intimate lives of the Parisian middle class with sharp wit and unflinching honesty.

Reza explores a deceptively simple question: what does it truly mean to be happy? Through interconnected narratives, the play dissects relationships and marriage with surgical precision. These are people who confuse expectations with desires, who choose security over authenticity, and who live with the constant nagging suspicion that they might be in the wrong life.

You know that moment—at the cheese counter in a supermarket, or bumping into an old friend on the tram—when you suddenly realize you took a wrong turn somewhere? When the person sleeping beside you might not be the right one? The play captures that unsettling recognition, and the very human instinct to simply turn off the light on the nightstand and continue as if nothing happened.

Yasmina Reza is renowned for examining the dark underbelly of middle-class society. Her play Art became one of the most frequently performed works of her generation, and The God of Carnage was adapted by Roman Polanski. Now the Berliner Ensemble brings her incisive social commentary about love, marriage, and the gap between the life we want and the one we're living to the German stage.

Read more