Bent (Characters)

Characters

Uncle Freddie Berber

Max's homosexual uncle, who pretends to be straight to stay in favor with their wealthy family, tries to arrange Max's escape. He advises Max to marry for appearances, like he did, and just have boys on the side so that Max can rejoin the family and be safe. When Max offers to do the family's bidding in exchange for help for Rudy, too, Freddie agrees to talk to Max's father about the deal.

Maximilian Berber

Max is the main character of the play that the audience follows from his decadent, directionless, homosexual lifestyle in Berlin to his metamorphic struggle for survival amidst the stark terrors of Dachau. At the opening of the story, Max is living in a perpetual state of escapism through sex, alcohol, and cocaine. Having been disowned by his wealthy family, he is behind in his rent and dependent on his childlike, but devoted lover, Rudy. Max is always trying to make a deal for money, but has sunk to dealing drugs. A handsome, charming weasel, Max fails to appreciate Rudy's patience, tolerance, and loving care. Max uses people, including a steady stream of one-night stands. It is this promiscuity that brings about his identification as a homosexual. When he unwittingly brings home a man wanted by Hitler's SS, he winds up a hunted man himself.

Surprisingly, despite his poor treatment of Rudy, he feels enough responsibility for his companion to insist that he will not make an escape attempt without Rudy. Consequently, Max misses his own chance for a passage to safety when they are captured. Ironically, his one refusal to act selfishly by abandoning Rudy to save himself ends up with Max being forced to kill Rudy to save himself.

When Max meets Horst, he learns that gays are treated the worst of anyone in the concentration camps. So he fakes being straight and Jewish as a survival ploy. Max believes that he is a rotten person and that gay men do not love. With the guidance of Horst, he learns about real love and dignity. Although he continues to work deals, first to get Horst's companionship and then to try to keep him well, Max finally makes a valid connection with another human. In tribute to Horst's bravery and commitment, at the end of the play, Max accepts his sexual identity and refuses to live further with a lie, even if it means not living at all.

Captain

It is with an SS Captain that Max barters sex for medicine. When the Captain realizes that the medicine was for Horst, he apparently feels betrayed and kills Horst, perhaps to teach Max a lesson or perhaps to eliminate a rival for Max's affection.

Wolfgang Granz

Wolf is the storm trooper Max picks up at Greta's club on the night that turns out to be the start of Hitler's purge of the storm troopers and gays. Wolf is tracked down at Max's apartment and killed, but Max and Rudy escape.

Greta

Greta is the drag queen owner of the nightclub where Rudy dances and Max hangs out. It is Greta who tells the SS where to find Wolf, but Greta also helps Max and Rudy with advice and money when they go to him for help. Because of the crackdown on gays, Greta closes his club and returns to his straight life as a husband and father.

Guard

The Guard who watches Max and Horst's work detail eventually shoots Horst.

Guards

Two SS Guards come to Max's apartment to arrest Wolf, then murder him.

Rudolph Hennings

Rudy is Max's lover and a dancer at Greta's nightclub. He is so devoted to Max that he puts up with all the other boys that Max drags home. More concerned about his plants and his dancing lessons than the Gestapo, Rudy is dreadfully naïve and never quite understands the danger that threatens them. Eventually, this innocence causes him to put his trust in the wrong person, and they are turned over to the Gestapo. Oddly enough, though, Rudy is more practical than Max when it comes to working and providing food. Rudy takes care of Max as much, if not more so, than Max takes care of Rudy.

Horst

Horst is the prison-savvy homosexual Max meets on the train to Dachau. It is Horst who advises Max about how to behave to survive and explains the pink triangle patch. Throughout the rest of the play, Horst tries to convince Max to be honest and wear a pink triangle, too. At first, Horst resists Max's pursuit of his friendship, but is sympathetic when Max explains how he got his yellow star. Later, Horst resents Max's interference when Max arranges for Horst to join his lonely, maddening, work detail. For three days, Horst refuses to talk with Max, but finally their sanity-saving dialogue begins, and they discover that they can bring each other sexual pleasure just through words and imagination. Horst's sarcastic humor shows a resilience that starts to fade when he becomes sick with a debilitating cough. He insists that they not try to save each other, but he has become Max's soul mate, and Max needs him for mental and emotional survival. Horst has not only told Max that he loves him, but has taught Max to love. Ironically, it is Max's deal-making to get medicine for Horst that causes Horst's death. Just as Horst has always advocated preserving honor through the honesty of wearing the pink triangle and enduring whatever that symbol brings, Horst goes to his death with honor. He dies in an act of defiance rather than submit to the degradation of playing the Captain's execution game.

Officer

The SS Officer on the prisoner train is the one who tortures Rudy, forces Max to beat Rudy, and forces Max to prove that he is not gay.

MEDIA ADAPTATIONS

• A motion picture version of Bent was made in 1997 by the theater director-design team of Sean Mathias and Stephen Brimson Lewis. With a cast that includes Ian McKellen, Jude Law, and Mick Jagger, the movie is available in both VHS and DVD format from MGM/UA Studios.