Die Fledermaus (1962)

Dr. Gabriel Eisenstein, legal counsel at Arabayam & Co., must serve an eight-day sentence in the district jail in Grinzing for insulting a public official. At the same time, however, he is supposed to attend Prince Orlofsky’s ball on behalf of his employer, Basil Arabayam, as the Marquis Renard, accompanied by a fictitious wife. This supposed wife is to persuade the prince to give her oil-rich lands in Bakutin on the Black Sea, which are to be passed on to Arabayam immediately. Pista von Bundassy, a friend of Eisenstein’s, obtains the necessary tickets and claims to have secured a one-day postponement of Eisenstein’s sentence so he can attend the ball. Wanting revenge on Eisenstein for a prank—Eisenstein had once left the sleeping Pista to his fate in a bat costume in Vienna’s Stadtpark—Pista forces Eisenstein at the ball to pretend that Adele, his own wife’s lady’s maid, is his wife. Instead of Eisenstein, Adele’s lover Alfred is found at the Eisensteins’ front door, personally arrested by the director of the Grinzing jail, and taken to prison by police officers. The prison director, Frank, has also received an invitation to Prince Orlofsky’s farewell ball under the false name Chevalier Chargrin. Eisenstein’s wife, Rosalinde, notices her husband’s deceptions and attends the ball disguised as her own twin sister Sonja, whom the prince already knows. When Eisenstein comes face to face with the woman he believes to be Sonja, he fears for his marriage and arranges an intimate meeting between Rosalinde and the prince. The next day, Rosalinde reveals her identity to her husband. The inevitable marital quarrel is followed by reconciliation. Prince Orlofsky gives Rosalinde 1,000 hectares of land, but keeps the oil-drilling rights.