Goethes geheimer Auftrag

Eckermann came to Weimar meaning to stay briefly, met Goethe, and stayed for the rest of his life on almost no money — and his name, as the house puts it, became a byword for a diligently servile existence. That is the joke the comedy starts from and then refuses to leave alone: the assistant is handed a weighty and highly secret commission, and the evening watches what a lifetime of deference does when it is finally asked to act. It is the sharpest thing in this repertoire about what standing next to a great man costs, and the house plays it as a comedy, which is the only way it works.