Wernher von Braun wanted to get to the moon at any cost. The cost was the lives of the 27,000 slave workers who died in Camp Dora, a secret location in the Harz mountains where, during the second world war, Von Braun developed the technology that eventually led to the first landing on the moon. (It was the same technology that also aided the development of the mobile phone.)
Julia Pascal's dream play makes all the connections in 75 minutes that you wouldn't exactly describe as an entertaining night out but is brave, informative, intelligent and desperately moving. It entwines the stories of those who worked in Dora with that of Braun, who joined the Nazi party in 1937 and then became a member of the SS. In Dora, where his office looked out over the courtyard where the misery - and sometimes the hangings - of the slave workers took place, Braun created the V2 rockets.
After the war von Braun avoided the Nuremberg trials by fleeing into the welcoming arms of the Americans. In the US he hosted his own Disney TV show, Tomorrowland, and was a key player in fulfilling the American dream of putting a man on the moon. Now who says justice isn't political?
With a sterling performance from Thomas Huber as the all too plausible and charming Braun, whose ability to lie to others and himself matches that of the far better known Albert Speer, Pascal's play puts a human face on the misery of history. She also does it in such a way that it is never sentimental but possesses a Brechtian austerity.
The faceless become individuals here, from 15-year-old Rudi, who sees his family disappear into Auschwitz, to the slave worker musing on the links between 1492 and 1942: "Funny how being born into the wrong sequence of numbers makes all the difference." It is also passionate without being partisan, and even plays devil's advocate. "My religion is rockets and I think yours is the Holocaust," the suave Von Braun tells a Jewish journalist who is probing his Nazi past.
The play takes a little time to gather momentum, and those unfamiliar with the second world war would do well to read the excellent programme note. But this is a dense, enlightening evening that packs a real punch in a great new space. At the very least, as you leave the theatre it will make you pause as you go to turn on your mobile again, remembering the stories of those who died so long ago.
Until April 7. Box office: 020-7503 1646.
