Although Lion Feuchtwanger completed "Die Petroleuminseln" ("The Oil Islands")
in 1923, four years passed before the play was performed. In 1927 "Die
Petroleuminseln" premiered at the Hamburger Schauplatz (Hamburg Theatre),
followed with a production at the Berlin Staatliches Schauspielhaus (Berlin
State Theatre) in 1928. Kurt Weill's wife Lotte Lenya
played the character Charmian Peruchacha in the Berlin production,
with Maria Koppenhöfer (shown in newspaper review) in the role of
the Deborah Gray.
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The play begins with the passengers of the ship "Peruchacha" listening
to the Weill's tune "The Song of the Brown Islands" on the gramophone.
Feuchtwanger then moves the setting to an oil drilling island just south
of the United States. "Die Petroleuminseln" is a psychological play that
focuses on the dilemnas of the protagonist, Deborah Gray. Although Gray
is President of the oil company controlling the island, she is hideously
ugly. Feuchtwanger harkends back with this play to his novella Die hässliche
Herzogin.
