Vienna, 1937. Germany is poised to annex Austria, social democracy has been all but obliterated and the country is lurching ever further to the right.

In the tiny ABC Theatre, the most politically noisy of the Kleinkunstbühnen – the “little theatres” of Vienna – a young communist Jewish playwright, Jura Soyfer, is a rising star. But he is increasingly in danger for lampooning the establishment with his blackly comedic plays such as Astoria, which brilliantly skewers the populism that shatters so many dreams.

Using material from Soyfer’s original, this new Astoria tells the story of a group of actors and writers who take huge risks to make theatre that entertains, engages and asks big questions. Come and join us at the ABC and meet them and their friend Jura, this extraordinary young man whose work resonates as loudly now as it did then.

Jura Soyfer. It’s not difficult to imagine the richness of writing that would have come from Jura Soyfer, had he not died in Buchenwald of typhoid in February 1939. ‘Astoria’ celebrates the wit, passion and prescience of this brilliant young man whose charisma shines down the years and whose legacy is still celebrated in Austria, Germany and across the world. Now it’s time for the UK to join that celebration.