Although I first saw this play at the Caldwell Theater in Boca Raton, Florida, in 1998, I was drawn to see it again in its off-Broadway production last week. Why did I pay it a return visit? Quite frankly, because I had enjoyed its provocative drama between Frau Ilse Hess, the haughty wife of Rudolph Hess, Hitler's second in command, and the hapless inmate, Isaac Baum, who had been plucked out of a concentration camp to serve as the gardener of her prized gardens.

From the moment he stumbles into her luxurious living room, where she is dreamily listening to the strains of Wagner's music, Isaac is subjected to her blinding racism, disdainful arrogance and unthinking mental cruelty. He responds at first with a willing compliance that grows into questioning rejoinders and a growing sense of self-confidence. As they get to know each other better, she begins to view him more as a fellow human being than as a humble servant. She gives him Rudolph Hess's clothes and joins him in admiring his improved appearance. She tries to teach him to dance the tango, and a subtle chemistry between the pair develops with a natural ease and sensitivity. She even offers him one of her rationed cigarettes as they share a bottle of wine.

It is now 1944, and Allied bombs are falling nearby. Then he learns the answer to the question he had asked her to try to find the answer to - the whereabouts of his 21-year-old daughter, also in a concentration camp, who had been trained by him as a horticulturist, and who had been conscripted as an earlier gardener at the same gardens.

As I wrote in my review of the play in The WIRE of April 4, 1998, "this adds up to strong stuff." The capacity audience last week sat entranced as the two characters spoke their lines flawlessly and brought them to life with vivacity and understanding.