Love and death under Third Reich

Veteran playwright John O’Keefe takes a largely forgotten tragedy of the Holocaust and exploits it to devastating effect in “Times Like These,” a Padua Playwrights production at 2100 Square Feet.

O’Keefe, who also directs, loosely bases his play on the real-life story of Meta Wolff and Joachim Gottschalk, married actors crushed under the juggernaut of the Third Reich. An idol of stage and film, the Aryan Gottschalk was threatened with dire consequences unless he separated from his Jewish wife, Wolff. But the night before Wolff and their only child were to be deported to Theresienstadt, the entire family committed suicide -- an event hushed up by the Nazis, who feared public riots if the news leaked out.

Laurie O’Brien plays Meta Wolff, while Norbert Weisser is Oskar Weiss, the star-crossed lovers of O’Keefe’s two-person drama. O’Keefe has eliminated the ill-fated child, preferring to concentrate solely on the intense private world of his protagonists, bright and privileged artists whose cozy marital microcosm implodes with Hitler’s ascension to power.

Set in Berlin, 1939, the action unfolds in a series of terse blackouts. In the opening scene, we see Meta, transcendent after her latest stage triumph, with Oskar fawning at her feet in adulation. Here, it is the celebrated Meta -- the luminous O’Brien, in a wrenching, authoritative turn -- who rules the marital roost. Oskar, portrayed with equal heft and authority by Weisser, is very much the lesser personage, still struggling for his place in Meta’s reflected limelight.

Ironically, it is the rise of the Nazis that provides Oskar with his big break. Cast as Hamlet, Oskar follows Meta’s suggestion and covertly transforms his Dane into a Nazi thug. It’s a brilliant, dangerous interpretation that, for the hitherto bland Oskar, is an artistic validation -- and a terrifying hint at the monster lurking inside him.

Oskar’s metamorphosis -- from nice guy to beast and back again -- speaks volumes about the human capacity for good and evil, that inborn pendulum swinging inside of every individual that can so easily overbalance conscience. Equally stunning is Meta’s pitiable progression from undisputed queen of German cafe society to a cowering, terrified prisoner in her own home. Of course, it is these characters’ love for one another that rights the pendulum and ennobles their plight. In O’Brien and Weisser’s skillful hands, O’Keefe’s beautifully balanced piece reverberates with terror, humanity and hope.

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‘Times Like These’

Where: 2100 Square Feet, 5615 San Vicente Blvd., Los Angeles

When: 8 p.m. Thursdays-Sundays

Ends: Nov. 16

Price: $20

Contact: (323) 692-2652

Running time: 2 hours, 10 minutes