About the work
“The Inheritance” (German title “Das Vermächtnis”) is a two-part play by the American playwright Matthew López, who freely transposes E. M. Forster’s 1910 novel “Howards End” into the lives of gay men in present-day New York. Stephen Daldry directed the world premiere at London’s Young Vic in March 2018; the production moved to the Noël Coward Theatre in the West End in September 2018 and to Broadway in November 2019. Including intervals, the two parts together last about seven hours. The German translation is by Hannes Becker, and the German-language premiere took place at the Residenztheater in Munich on 30 January 2022.
Plot
Set between 2015 and 2018, the play follows a circle of gay men in New York, above all the couple Eric Glass and Toby Darling. Toby finds success with a novel about his troubled childhood that is being adapted for the stage, while the young actor Adam puts the couple’s relationship at risk; Leo, a sex worker, is Adam’s exact double. Eric befriends the older Walter Poole, partner of the billionaire Henry Wilcox, and learns that during the AIDS epidemic Walter cared for dying men at a country house in upstate New York; before his death Walter decides that Eric should have the house. Young men narrate the story while also acting it out, accompanied by Morgan, a character based on E. M. Forster.
Cultural significance
“The Inheritance” won four Laurence Olivier Awards in 2019, including Best New Play, and in 2021 won the Tony Award for Best Play among others; López was the first Latino writer to receive that honour. The Broadway production had to close early in March 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Munich German-language premiere was invited to the Berlin Theatertreffen in 2023, and further German-language productions followed in Hanover, Münster and Bamberg, among other cities.