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Die Fledermaus (The Bat) is a comic operetta by Johann Strauss II (music) and Carl Haffner and Richard Genée ( libretto). It premièred on April 5, 1874 at the Theater an der Wien, Vienna, Austria.
The original source for Die Fledermaus is a farce by German playwright Julius Roderich Benedix ( 1811- 1873), Das Gefängnis (The Prison). Another source is a French vaudeville play, Le Réveillon, by Henri MeilhacHenri Meilhac ( February 21, 1831 1897), French dramatist, was born in Paris. While a young man began writing fanciful articles for the newspapers and vaudevilles for the theatres, in a vivacious boulevardier spirit which brought him to the front. About 1 and Ludovic HalévyLudovic Halevy ( January 1, 1834 May 8, 1908), French author, was born in Paris. His father, Leon Halevy (1802-1883), was a clever and versatile writer, who tried almost every branch of literature--prose and verse, vaudeville, drama, history--without, how. Their play was first translated by Carl Haffner as a straight play to be produced in Vienna. However, the peculiarly French custom of the réveillon (a midnight supper party) caused problems, which were solved by the decision to adapt the play as a libretto for Johann Strauss, with the réveillon replaced by a Viennese ball. At this point Haffner's translation was handed over for adaptation to Richard Genée, who subsequently claimed not only that he had made a fresh translation from scratch but that he had never even met Haffner.
The Baron von Eisenstein has been committed to prisonA prison is a place in which people are confined and deprived of a range of liberties. Prisons conventionally are institutions authorised by governments and forming part of a country's criminal justice system, or as facilities for holding prisoners of war for eight days for insulting an official, partly through the inefficiency of his attorney, the stuttering Dr. Blind, and is to begin his imprisonment this day. His friend, Notary Falke, however, persuades him to postpone it until the morrow and to accompany him to a ball at the residence of Prince Orlofsky, where he will meet the handsome ladies of the opera ballet. Falke had been at a masked ball the previous winter, costumed as a batThis article is about mammals. For other bats, see bat (disambiguation) and bats. Pteropodidae Emballonuridae Rhinopomatidae Craseonycteridae Rhinolophidae Nycteridae Megadermatidae Vespertilionidae Molossidae Antrozoidae Natalidae Myzopodidae Thyropterid, and had been compelled by Eisenstein to walk to his home in broad daylight to the joy and amusement of the populace. He hopes to find an opportunity for vengeance at the coming ball. Eisenstein accepts the invitation, and telling his wife he is going to prison, and taking a mournful farewell of her and the maid Adèle, hastens with Falke to the ball. After his departure Rosalinde, his wife, is visited by a former admirer, the singing teacher, Alfred, whose behaviour is rather free. The night has set in and Frank, the governor of the prison, has come to take Eisenstein to jail. He finds Alfred taking his ease attired in a smoking jacket, and he, in order not to compromise Rosalinde, moved by her prayers, is induced to represent himself as Eisenstein and to accompany Frank. Falke, who has received plein pouvoir from Prince Orlofsky, has also invited the governor of the prison, Frank, the maid Adèle, and to complete the joke, Rosalinde, to be his guests at the ball. The latter, in order to observe her husband, appears masked. She is introduced by Falke as an Hungarian countess, and succeeds during an amorous tête-à-tête in abstracting from the pockets of her husband his valuable watch, to use in the future as evidence of his impropiety. Frank has paid court to Adèle, and the next morning they all find themselves in prison, when the confusion increases, for Falke has introduced Eisenstein as Marquis Renard, Frank as Chevalier Chagrin and Adèle as an actress. It is still further increased by the jailer, Frosch, who has profited by the absence of the prison director to become gloriously drunk. Adèle arrives to obtain the assistance of the Chevalier Chagrin, Eisenstein to begin his prison term, Alfred wants to get out of jail, Rosalinde to commence action for divorce, and Frank is still intoxicated. Frosch locks up Adèle and her companion, and the height of the tumult has been reached when Falke arrives with all the guests of the ball and declares the whole as an act of vengeance for the "Fledermaus." Everything is amicably arranged, but Eisenstein is compelled to serve his full term in jail.