Jerome Kircher and Helene Fillieres, photo: Richard Schroeder

Yet Kleist (1877-1811) treats his sources with a certain ironic distance, committing what might euphemistically be called the "textual incongruities" which have since troubled audiences and academics. Such liberties are instrumental to developing Kleist's personal struggle to match an imperfect world to his belief in an all-conquering Love and whose profound deception by the disconnect between inner and outer realities ever troubled his short life.

 It is this tension between illusion and disillusion that Engels adroitly emphasizes, creating both a magical love story in the tale of the adoring Kaethchen and the oblivious Count Wetter von Strahl, and a deconstruction of this, from a fragmented, storybook set to a heteroclite physical language somewhere between medieval and modern.  As Kleist intended, however, the relationship between Katherine and the Count is the focus of attention; their faithful cherishing of a shared, subconscious vision of each other manages to make the world they live in resemble the one they live for.

As the divinely chosen couple, Julie-Marie Parmentier and Jérôme Kircher embody extremes of response to destiny: the adolescent who follows hers with the dogged certainty of self-actualization while her more mature partner ignores the obvious (the humble conviction of Katherine), to run into traps of his own making. And if man's imperfections and divine will clash on earth, in Engels' production, as in Kleist's play, the absolute belief in a redeeming inner self is not only courageous but salutary, perhaps even other-wordly. Last season's critically acclaimed show returns for a one month run.

To Dec. 31, Tues-Sat, 8 pm, Sun, 3 pm, Odéon-Théâtre de l'Europe/Ateliers Berthier, corner of rue Suarès and bd Berthier, 17e, M° Porte de Clichy, 16-32 euros, tel: 01.44.85.40.40.

More theater at: http://www.paris-theater.blogspot.com