Oberammergau, Bavaria • The Passion Play

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The 2022 Passion Play in Oberammergau

Oberammergau is a scenic town of about 5,500 inhabitants situated on the Ammer River in the foothills of the Bavarian Alps. Most of the time it is a normal small Bavarian town, but once every ten years Oberammergau is transformed into a thespian metropolis with bearded men everywhere you look. Once a decade, from May to October the Passion Play takes over life in Oberammergau. At least it did until the 2020 Passion Play year and the Covid-19 pandemic. But 2020 is not the first time the town has had to alter the dates of play. More about that below.

NOTE: The 2022 edition’s 110 live performances ended on 2 October 2022. But as we point out below, Oberammergau and its region are worth a visit at any time.

Oberammergau from Kofel peak

Oberammergau and the Ammer River from the summit of Kofel peak (1,342 m/4,403 ft). PHOTO: David Edgar (Wikimedia Commons)

Although the Passion Play performance is the town’s biggest tourist draw, Oberammergau is worth visiting at any time. You don’t have to wait a decade to enjoy its natural scenery. Set in a lovely valley surrounded by Alpine peaks, the town has much to offer, including history, sightseeing, shopping, and more.

The first thing visitors notice in the village are the houses and buildings decorated with what is known as Lüftlmalerei, a playful form of fresco art that creates an optical illusion of space, objects, figures, and windows that may or may not actually be there. It is a folk variation of trompe-l’oeil (Scheinmalerei) that imitates architectural and decorative elements. Oberammergau is also known for another art form: woodcarving. This handicraft is the work of the so-called Herrgottschnitzer (“Lord God carvers”) who carve wooden figures with religious themes.

Oberammergau Pilatushaus - art

An excellent example of Lüftlmalerei in Oberammergau at the Pilatushaus. PHOTO: Shakespr98 (Wikimedia Commons)

Oberammergau

Although its history goes back to Roman times, the town of Oberammergau was first incorporated in 1818 after governmental reforms in Bavaria, which was then a separate kingdom. The region is known for its woodcarving crafts, which are well documented in the Oberammergau Museum. Oberammergau is also home to the NATO School, whose mission is to conduct courses in support of the current and developing NATO strategy and policy.

The well-known German author and humorist Ludwig Thoma (1867-1921) came from Oberammergau. His birth house is one of the town’s attractions.

Getting There
By car from Munich, Oberammergau can be reached via the A95 autobahn and the scenic German Alpine Road (die Deutsche Alpenstraße), also known as Bundesstraße 23 (Federal Highway 23). From Augsburg or Munich rail connections are possible via Murnau, connecting to the Ammergaubahn rail connection that ends in Oberammergau.

Scenic Sights and Attractions
Even in the nine out of ten years when there is no Passion Play, Oberammergau and the Ammergau Alps region have many other sights and activities to offer visitors. Oberammergau happens to be located in one of Germany’s most scenic areas, not many miles away from Garmisch-Partenkirchen, a former Winter Olympics site that is famous for its winter sports attractions. Germany’s highest mountain, the Zugspitze, and the Austrian border are only a short distance south of Oberammergau. Among the area’s many attractions are…

  • Ettal | Only about three miles (5 km) south of Oberammergau lies the small town of Ettal and the beautiful Ettal Abbey (1330). It was a monk (Othmar Weis) from this Benedictine monastery who wrote the first prose Passion Play script for Oberammergau in 1810. For more about Ettal, see the English and German web links below.
  • Wieskirche | The Pilgrimage Church of Wies is an architectural wonder only a short drive from Oberammergau. The rococo Wieskirche was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1983. See the web link below.
  • Alpine Lakes | Within a short distance of Oberammeragau there are a number of beautiful lakes, including the Staffelsee and the Kochelsee.
  • Linderhof Palace | All across Bavaria and in Oberammergau there are numerous references to the former Bavarian King Ludwig (I and II). One of Ludwig II’s most spectacular palaces is Linderhof, a Versailles-inspired marvel that is the smallest of the three palaces built by the king and the only one he lived to see completed. Linderhof is just off the B23 highway (Ettaler Straße) not far from Ettal. There is also a bus connection (9622) to Linderhof from Oberammergau. For more, see the web links below.
  • Garmisch-Partenkirchen | In 1936 this Bavarian town was the site of the Winter Olympic Games. Today it is a popular ski and winter sports resort. The 2011 Alpine World Ski Championships were held there. Garmisch-Partenkirchen is only a short drive from Oberammergau, near the Austrian border.
The Passion Play
Oberammergau Passionstheater front

Oberammergau’s Passion Play Theater (2010) seats about 4,700 spectators. PHOTO: Passion Play Oberammergau website

The 42nd Passion Play was supposed to take place in 2020. But that was before the Covid-19 pandemic arrived and changed a lot of plans in Germany and all over the world. The event is now rescheduled for May-October 2022.

It all began in 1633 during the Thirty Years War when the Black Death (der schwarze Tod) came to Oberammergau. After 80 people had been struck down by the bubonic plague, the citizens of the town promised to perform a passion play every ten years if God would spare Oberammergau from more deaths. (Passion plays were common throughout the region at that time.)

1934 poster - Oberammergau

A 1934 Passion Play poster designed by Jupp Wiertz (1888–1939) announces “Germany is calling you!” The Nazis promoted the “Aryan” aspects of the play. PHOTO: Wikimedia Commons

Legend versus Facts
The Oberammergau legend goes roughly as follows (from Wikipedia): “An outbreak of bubonic plague devastated Bavaria during the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648). Bad Kohlgrub [five miles north of Oberammergau] was so depopulated that only two married couples remained alive. The village of Oberammergau remained plague-free until 25 September 1633, when a man named Kaspar Schisler returned home after working in the nearby village of Eschenlohe. Over the next 33 days, 81 villagers would die, half of Oberammergau’s population. On 28 October 1633, the villagers vowed that if God spared them from the plague, they would perform a play every 10 years depicting the life and death of Jesus. Nobody died of plague in Oberammergau after that vow, and the villagers kept their word to God by performing the passion play for the first time in 1634.”

Although the legendary tale is mostly true, there are a number of historical facts that differ in certain points. To be fair, the discrepancies could have been introduced by the retelling of an oral history that was not written down until 1733, a century after the plague reached Oberammergau. In reality, there was an outbreak of plague in Oberammergau, but it took place from September 1632 to March 1633, when there were a total of 84 deaths from all causes. Deaths followed an epidemic curve instead of ending suddenly. There was one death in September 1632, increasing to 20 deaths in March 1633, and ending with one death in July 1633. There is also no record of a man named Kaspar Schisler. Only two couples got married in Bad Kohlgrub in 1634, instead of only two couples surviving the plague. There were 39 marriages in Bad Kohlgrub in 1635, so hundreds of villagers must have survived.

The first Passion Play performance in Oberammergau took place in 1634 in the church graveyard with 60-70 performers. While other communities soon forgot similar promises, Oberammergau has faithfully kept the tradition going. 2010 marked the 41st time that the town’s citizens have performed in the Passion Play. In fact, only citizens of Oberammergau, or persons who have lived there for at least 20 years are allowed to take part in the performances.

Oberammergau stage from inside the theater

The stage of the Passionstheater. About half of Oberammergau’s 5,500 residents participate in the Passion Play onstage or backstage. PHOTO: Oberammergau Passion Play

The play is performed in German only, in a covered, open-air theater that seats about 4,700 people. (See photo above.) The first half of the performance runs from 2:30 to 5:00 p.m. Following a dinner break, the play resumes from 8:00 until 10:30 p.m. It was only beginning in 2010 that the play extended into the evening, and that was over the objections of traditionalists in Oberammergau.

In 1680, after five Passion Play seasons, the schedule shifted to years that end in zero. Only in 1770 and in 1940 were there no performances. Similar to what just happened in 2020, the 1920 play was moved to 1922 because of the impacts of the First World War. Royal Bavarian interference delayed the 1880 performance until 1881. To commemorate the 300th and 350th anniversaries of the Passion Play, special performances were held in 1934 and 1984 respectively.

The Passion Play has always attracted noted personalities of the time. The delayed 1922 edition was attended by the Italian composer Giacomo Puccini, Herbert Hoover (then US Secretary of Commerce [1921-1929], later US president), and Italian Cardinal Eugenio Giovanni Pacelli (then Apostolic Nuncio to Germany, the future Pope Pius XII). In 1930 the notables included British Prime Minister James Ramsay MacDonald, Queen Elisabeth of Greece, and the American automobile magnate Henry Ford (a known antisemite).

Henry Ford in Oberammergau 1930

Henry Ford (in dark coat and hat) walking with friends and admirers in Oberammergau on his way to the 1930 Passion Play. PHOTO: Georg Pahl, German Federal Archives (Wikimedia Commons)

During the National Socialist era the Passion Play was not immune to Nazi, antisemitic influences. Adolf Hitler, accompanied by a large retinue of Nazi officials, paid a visit to the Passion Play Theater on 13 August 1934, the year of a special 300th anniversary performance. He calls Pontius Pilate the prototype of the Roman who is superior “in race and intelligence” and who seems “like a rock in the midst of the Jewish vermin and swarm.”

Postwar criticism of the play was aimed at its stereotypical blaming of the Jews for the death of Christ. In 1950 two prominent American Jews spearheaded efforts to attack the antisemitic aspects of the Passion Play. Playwright Arthur Miller and composer Leonard Bernstein led a petition to cancel the 1950 edition. However, the townspeople of Oberammergau defiantly restaged the 1934 play without any alterations. Despite the controversy, notable people attending the 1950 production included US general Dwight D. Eisenhower (later US president), West German chancellor Konrad Adenauer, and Cardinal Faulhaber, archbishop of Munich and Freising.

Critics, Christians and Jews, continued to call for changes in 1960 – without success. Finally, in the 1970s, Oberammergau officials invited representatives from Jewish organizations to suggest revisions, but no significant changes were made until 1986. That year 24-year-old Christian Stückl was appointed director, reflecting a generational change. Even Stückl encountered efforts to get him fired in 1989, but the 39th Passion Play in 1990 went ahead, with fundamental reforms of the text and music.

The play’s antisemitism was not the only controversial aspect. Another play “tradition” that refused to die was a sexist ban on participation by married women and females over 35 years of age. A lawsuit filed by three Oberammergau women dragged on for years until a Munich court ruled to abolish that regulation in 1990. Christian Stückl would continue to be the play’s director in 2000, having won a citizens’ referendum to continue in that position. Along with dramatic advisor Otto Huber, Stückl continued to excise anti-Jewish elements and enlarge the role of Jesus as a defender of his Jewish faith. The 2000 Passion Play, the 40th, attracted an audience of 520,000 for a total of 110 performances. For the first time ever, in another break with tradition, local Muslims were allowed to participate in the 2000 play.

In 2010, again under Stückl’s leadership, the 41st Passion Play was revised once more, and the production’s set designer Stefan Hageneier created a more vivid, brighter stage production. Despite objections from many in the town, the show was also extended into the evening hours. For the first time, the formerly uncovered stage got a movable roof.

Guests attending the 2010 Passion Play included Chancellor Angela Merkel, the German president Christian Wulff, Cardinal Reinhard Marx, archbishop of Munich und Freising; and Cardinal Timothy Michael Dolan, archbishop of New York.

As noted above, the 42nd Passion Play in 2020 was cancelled because of the Covid-19 pandemic, and rescheduled for 2022.

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