The production will run from the 16th January until the 8th February.
It has been announced that Erik Kahn’s Canned Goods will make its London debut in 2025, playing at the Southwark Playhouse’s Borough venue from January.
Based on true events, the production is set in 1939, just before the outbreak of World War II. It is a story of deception, power, and survival on the eve of a Nazi invasion.
It’s 1939. On the border between Germany and Poland, the shadow of fascism is inching closer. Hitler has a plan: stage a violent Polish attack on a German-speaking radio station, and use the attack to justify a Nazi invasion. But how do you pull off an act of deception designed to keep the UK from slowing Hitler’s advance on Eastern Europe?
German farmer Franciszek Honiok finds himself arrested and imprisoned in a jail cell on the border. Alongside him are two prisoners from Dachau: a Jewish philosopher and a German janitor. As the mission looms closer and tensions build, the three men must wrestle with an impossible unknown. Can they survive a plan much bigger than themselves? And are they the ‘canned goods’ their captors keep discussing?
Talking about the play, Writer Erik Kahn comments, “I was initially motivated to tell the story of Hitler’s false flag operation that proceeded the start of World War II. While the play is based on historical records, the real story that evolved is the complex psychological entanglement between three prisoners and the SS Major who dictates their fates. Canned Goods is intended to unmask those who perpetrate cruelty, while illuminating the political proliferation of false facts to advance acts of oppression. Themes that are obviously and sadly relevant today.”
This UK production is directed by Charlotte Cohn, with lighting by Ryan Joseph Stafford and sound by Anna Short. Casting for the production has yet to be announced.
To book tickets visit: https://southwarkplayhouse.co.uk/productions/canned-goods/