About the work
The Singspiel by Ralph Benatzky, with interpolated numbers by Robert Stolz, Bruno Granichstaedten and others, was premiered in 1930 at the Großes Schauspielhaus in Berlin. The libretti are by Hans Müller-Einigen and Erik Charell, based on a comedy of 1898. Im weißen Rößl (The White Horse Inn) is probably the best-known work of the late Viennese operetta and mixes styles ranging from waltz through Schlager to jazz.
Plot
In summer the illustrious holiday company gathers on the Wolfgangsee at the "White Horse Inn". Head waiter Leopold is unhappily in love with the resolute innkeeper Josepha Vogelhuber — but she has set her sights on the elegant lawyer Dr. Siedler. In parallel, the shy Sigismund courts the shrill daughter of the Berlin manufacturer Giesecke, while Emperor Franz Joseph himself arrives for summer repose. After misunderstandings, scenes of jealousy and a wise audience with the Emperor, all the couples find their way to one another: Leopold gets his Josepha, Dr. Siedler the lovesick Ottilie, and even Sigismund his Klärchen.
Cultural significance
Im weißen Rößl is the most-performed German-language Singspiel after Die Fledermaus and has been filmed many times, most recently in 2013 with Edita Malovčić and Tobias Licht. Songs such as "Im weißen Rößl am Wolfgangsee" and "Es muss was Wunderbares sein" became common cultural property. The work was banned by the National Socialists as "Jewish-contaminated" and could return to the repertoire only slowly after 1945. Today it is regarded as a showpiece of light summer operetta — but is also staged in ironically fractured productions that stress its origin shortly before the fall of the Weimar Republic.