THE SANDWICHES THAT COULD
HAVE CHANGED THE WORLD

A wickedly funny revision of history
delights even as it faces catastrophe

All they ever wanted was a sandwich…

That’s the revised motivation for the young Bosnian conspirators who plotted to assassinate Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, in 1914. It’s posited by playwright Rajiv Joseph in Archduke, his wickedly absurdist comedy about a deadly serious moment in world history, which opened last night by Roundabout Theatre Company at the Laura Pels Theatre.

Poor fellows indeed: In Joseph’s revisionist version of the violent event that incited WWI, these would-be assassins are a teenage “gang that can’t shoot straight.” Gavrilo (Jake Berne) and Nedeljko (Jason Sanchez) met in an abandoned warehouse miles from Sarajevo, soon joined by Trifko (Adrien Rolet). All have been sent there by a doctor who had diagnosed them as “lungers” (terminal tuberculosis victims) and therefore fitting candidates for martyrdom to the Serbian political cause against Austro-Hungary’s autocratic rule – that is, if they can be convinced to commit an act of violence.

Patrick Page (Dragutin “Apis” Dimitrijevic), Jason Sanchez (Nedeljko),
Adrien Rolet (Trifko), Jake Berne (Gavrilo), Kristine Nielsen (Sladjana)

That becomes the job of Dragutin “Apis” Dimitrijevic, the fierce Chief of Serbia’s Intelligence Division — played with over-the-top flamboyance by Patrick Page. In a hilarious scene set in Apis’s quarters, dominated by an enormous regional map, he indoctrinates these clueless lads into the ultra-Nationalist Serbian ideology with a lecture on the unjust history of the Slavic states (or what he calls “the cesspool of someone else’s sickness”). The famished boys are seated at a huge banquet table and served a sumptuous feast by Apis’s cook Sladjana (an equally hilarious Kristine Nielsen), who wheels in cart after cart of dishes to sate them. As they ravenously consume the endless banquet, Apis delivers his pitch, declaring that their terminal illness is unjust. “The world has conspired against you… how does it feel?” he cries, proclaiming the Archduke Franz Ferdinand responsible for their illness. They must therefore perform the assassination that would free Bosnia and Herzegovina of Austro-Hungary’s suffocating rule, unify the Slavic territories, and establish a free South Slavic state. As a reward for their martyrdom, Apis offers each boy a pair of black gloves, a symbol of Slavic unification. He also gives them a bottle of cyanide, which he instructs them to ingest after they assassinate the Duke and Duchess in Sarajevo — which is to happen in just two days’ time.

(back) Patrick Page (Dragutin “Apis” Dimitrijevic),
(front) Jason Sanchez (Nedeljko), Adrien Rolet (Trifko), Jake Berne (Gavrilo)

“This notion of meaning in our lives, this notion of lashing out on the sickness in our chests, this notion of not being forgotten… how is it such things might be achieved by suicide?” asks Gavrilo, posing the play’s existential question. It goes unanswered by the fanatical Apis. He commands them to take a train to Sarajevo the following night (none of them has ever been on a train before, they confess with excitement), seducing them with the promise of sleeping-car accommodations and free sandwiches. But first, Apis requires them to rehearse the assassination itself — drolly staged by director Darko Tresnjak.

Adrien Rolet (Trifko), Jason Sanchez (Nedeljko), Jake Berne (Gavrilo)

The night before they depart for Sarajevo, in a scene set in a church, Sladjana gives the boys cherries dipped in brandy (which turn out to be marinated kittens’ hearts) and arms them with sacks filled with tasty snacks for the journey. During the train ride, they confess to one another that they’ve never “been with a woman before,” and speculate how they might fit that experience in — along with a final sandwich — before assassinating the Duke and Duchess and taking cyanide. That conversation leads to another question: “Maybe the world don’t have to end at all,” says Gavrilo. “We can just get off the train….”

Jason Sanchez (Nedeljko), Jake Berne (Gavrilo), and Adrien Rolet (Trifko)

Given its grave subject matter, the surprise of Archduke is its entertainment value. Under Tresnjak’s spirited direction, Patrick Page and Kristine Nielsen make a ferociously funny pair, and the trio of “boys” give wonderfully physicalized performances. Alexander Dodge’s turnstile set is impressive, with its gigantic, imposing map of the region dominating the action.

Mr. Joseph’s historical romp may be more hysterical than historical (although the characters were real, some details regarding their lives are altered). But like Stephen Sondheim’s Assassins, he uses black comedy to address the grave issue of why individuals — particularly young ones — become radicalized in the first place, and what propels them into political violence.

During an existential interchange, they ponder the consequences of not committing the assassination at all. “Nobody’d sing songs about us… We’d be forgotten,” says Trifko. “That’s okay,” says Gavrilo. “It would be nice to be forgotten.”

With those lines hanging in the air during the play’s final moments, the assassination itself (which of course happened, performed by Gavrilo) is not dramatized. As the lights come down, we see the trio sitting downstage, eating their coveted sandwiches.

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photos by Joan Marcus, 2025

Archduke
Roundabout Theatre Company
Laura Pels Theatre at the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center
Tues-Sat at 7:30; Wed and Sat at 2; Sun at 3
ends on December 21, 2024
for tickets, call 212.719.1300 or visit Roundabout

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