YORK Settlement Community Players are to bring a little-known Bertolt Brecht play to the York stage for the first time from April 30 to May 2 at Friargate Theatre, Lower Friargate.

Brecht’s Expressionist drama Drums In The Night focuses on the personal and political effects of the First World War in 1919 Germany as it follows a returning soldier, Andreas Kragler (played by George Stagnell), through the streets and bars of a Berlin in turmoil in the immediate post-war period.

Kragler has been thought dead for the past four years. He comes home to find his fiancée, Anna Balicke (Emma Dubruel), has become engaged instead to the war profiteer Friedrich Murk (James Witchwood).

Giving up hope of a life with her, Kragler is drawn into Berlin’s backstreets and is convinced by a barman, Glubb (Ian Giles), and his bunch of lowlifes to join the Spartacist Uprising, now taking place across the city. When the final drums sound, and he is torn between his desire for Anna and his new-found politics, will he fight for the revolution or for the girl he loves?

Written between 1919 and 1920, Drums In The Night was Brecht’s second play. By chance the show’s director, Claire Morley, is the same age as Brecht when he wrote his play. “It’s engaging for many different reasons,” she says. “There’s the draw of Brecht, who is undoubtedly one of the greatest playwrights of the 20th century; the insight into a part of Germany’s history that is often overlooked; and there are the universal themes of love, betrayal, jealousy and disaffection with politics, which will strike a chord.”

Tickets for the 7.30pm evening performance and 2pm Saturday matinee cost £10. Call 01904 613000 or visit ridinglights.org