A German Life

I had no idea what was going on. Or very little. No more than most people. So you can't make me feel guilty.


Brunhilde Pomsel's life spanned the twentieth century. She struggled to make ends meet as a secretary in Berlin during the 1930s, her many employers including a Jewish insurance broker, the German Broadcasting Corporation and, eventually, Joseph Goebbels. Christopher Hampton's play is based on the testimony she gave when she finally broke her silence to a group of Austrian filmmakers, shortly before she died in 2016.

Maggie Smith, alone on stage, plays Brunhilde Pomsel.


Christopher Hampton's play is drawn from the testimony Pomsel gave when she finally broke her silence shortly before she died to a group of Austrian filmmakers, and from their documentary A German Life (Christian Krönes, Olaf Müller, Roland Schrotthofer and Florian Weigensamer, produced by Blackbox Film & Media Productions).