The Trial

The Egress Theatre Co. presents The Trial, based on the novel by Franz Kafka. Andrew Bielski directs, with an original musical score by Patrick Penta. The cast features Daryl Brown, Daniel Granke, Jonathan Levy,
Jason Smith, Robby Weinstein, and Matthew Woods.

On his deathbed, Franz Kafka requested that his friend and confidante, Max Brod, destroy all of his unpublished manuscripts. This request was famously refused by Brod, who went on to oversee the editing and publication of Kafka’s remaining work, including the fragmentary novel The Trial, published in 1925, the year after Kafka’s death.

The Trial tells of Joseph K., the chief executive officer of a large bank who is awakened one morning to find that he has been placed under arrest for a crime of which he is ignorant. His arrest sets in motion a series of encounters with a corrupt and absurd legal system, its officials and associates, as Joseph K. struggles to defend his innocence.

In turns terrifying, erotic and hysterical, The Trial touches, through the language of nightmare and myth, upon humankind’s social and spiritual predicament in the labyrinth of the post-industrial age.