Pandora’s Box is the title of the second play in Frank Wedekind’s Lulu cycle, and it was adapted in part for the 1929 film Pandora’s Box.
Wedekind created Lulu as the central figure of a pair of dramas. The first, Earth Spirit, was published in 1895, while Pandora’s Box followed in 1904. Together they trace Lulu’s relationships, social rise, collapse, and eventual violent fate.
Georg Wilhelm Pabst’s 1929 film uses material from both plays rather than adapting only the second drama. Its German title, Die Büchse der Pandora, matches the title of Wedekind’s second Lulu play and also echoes the ancient Greek myth.
A frequent confusion is treating Pandora’s Box as the name of the first play or as a title invented for the film. Earth Spirit is the earlier drama; Pandora’s Box is the later companion play and the source of the film’s title.