LENI'S LAST LAMENT and I AM MY OWN WIFE to Open Intiman Theatre Season
Jodie Markell and Dani Davis star in the Seattle theatre's fall lineup exploring twentieth-century Europe.
Intiman Theatre will launch its 54th season with two internationally acclaimed plays that confront the complicated relationship between history, identity, and survival. Opening this fall, Leni's Last Lament and I Am My Own Wife introduce Intiman's 2026–27 season theme of “Truth • Resistance • Reinvention” through two remarkable lives shaped by the upheavals of twentieth-century Europe.
One woman attempts to reclaim a legacy forever entwined with Nazi propaganda. The other survives both the Nazi and East German Communist regimes while living openly as a trans woman against extraordinary odds. Together, these unforgettable works ask audiences to consider who shapes history, whose stories endure, and how memory, identity, and moral responsibility intersect.
"These plays remind us that history is never settled—it lives in the stories we preserve, the ones we challenge, and the ones we choose to tell," says Intiman Artistic Director Jennifer Zeyl. "Each centers on a person navigating impossible circumstances. One seeks to justify a deeply controversial legacy, while the other demonstrates the extraordinary courage required to survive when living authentically. Together, they invite audiences into difficult conversations that are especially urgent today."
The season opens with Leni's Last Lament (October 9–18, 2026), starring Obie Award winner Jodie Markell. Written by Gil Kofman and directed by Richard Caliban, the acclaimed production premiered at the 2025 Edinburgh Fringe, where it was named a Critic's Pick by The London Times. Blending cabaret, courtroom drama, and biting satire, the play imagines filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl confronting her own legacy through music, storytelling, and dark humor, challenging audiences to wrestle with the uneasy relationship between artistic brilliance, propaganda, and personal accountability.
In November, Intiman presents I Am My Own Wife (November 4–22, 2026), Doug Wright's Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning play directed by Wesley Frugé. Based on the remarkable true story of Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, a German trans woman who survived both the Nazi regime and East German Communist rule, the play follows Wright's growing fascination with—and questions about—Charlotte's extraordinary life. In a tour-de-force performance, a single actor portrays nearly forty characters in a riveting examination of memory, survival, and the complexities of truth.
"In opposition to the all-too-common flattening of trans women—villainized in life and martyred in death—the woman we meet in I Am My Own Wife is expansive," says Dani Davis, who stars as Charlotte von Mahlsdorf. "Charlotte is, at times, enchanting; at others, timid. She is intelligent, passionate, defiant, protective, evasive, bitter, prideful, and, above all, fiercely self-defining. It's fitting that a woman who dedicated her life to preserving history is remembered in such vivid detail. To portray her as anything less would be a disservice."
Together, these productions launch Intiman's 54th season with two unforgettable theatrical experiences that examine how people navigate extraordinary circumstances—and how the stories we inherit continue to shape the world around us.
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Barefoot in the Park State Theater (8/21-9/06) |
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Freak The Mighty Seattle Repertory Theatre (7/30-9/06) |
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& Juliet First Interstate Center for the Arts(Formally INB Performing Arts Center) (10/13-10/18) |
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Luchadora! Lakewood Playhouse (12/05-12/20) |
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Robin Hood/Macbeth Island Shakespeare Festival (7/17-9/06) |
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Cabaret Ballyhoo Theatre (9/11-9/27) |
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Come From Away Village Theatre (11/10-12/20) |
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Complemento Latitude Theatre (8/01-8/30) |
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Galileo Intiman Theatre (1/10-12/30) |
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Come From Away Village Theatre (1/02-1/24) |