Copenhagen (play)

Copenhagen
1998 Premiere season programme
Written by	Michael Frayn
Characters	Niels Bohr Margrethe Bohr Werner Heisenberg
Date premiered	1998
Place premiered	London, England
Original language	English
Subject	Physics, Politics, WWII, Memory, Perspective
Genre	Historical Drama

Copenhagen is a play by Michael Frayn, based around an event that occurred in Copenhagen in 1941, a meeting between the physicists Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg. It premiered in London in 1998 at the National Theatre, running for more than 300 performances, starring David Burke (Niels Bohr), Sara Kestelman (Margrethe Bohr), and Matthew Marsh (Werner Heisenberg).

It opened on Broadway at the Royale Theatre on 11 April 2000 and ran for 326 performances. Directed by Michael Blakemore, it starred Philip Bosco (Niels Bohr), Michael Cumpsty (Werner Heisenberg), and Blair Brown (Margrethe Bohr). It won the Tony Award for Best Play, Best Featured Actress in a Play, Blair Brown, and Best Direction of a Play (Michael Blakemore).

In 2002, the play was adapted as a film by Howard Davies, produced by the BBC and presented on the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) in the United States.

The spirits of Werner Heisenberg, Niels Bohr and Bohr's wife Margrethe, meet after their deaths to attempt to answer the question that Margrethe poses in the first line of the play, "Why did he [Heisenberg] come to Copenhagen?” They spend the remainder of the two-act drama presenting, debating and rejecting theories that may answer that question.

Heisenberg – "No one understands my trip to Copenhagen. Time and time again I’ve explained it. To Bohr himself, and Margrethe. To interrogators and intelligence officers, to journalists and historians. The more I've explained, the deeper the uncertainty has become. Well, I shall be happy to make one more attempt."