Which playwright’s works inspired the 1929 film Pandora’s Box?

Frank Wedekind’s works inspired the 1929 film Pandora’s Box. Georg Wilhelm Pabst adapted the film from Wedekind’s two Lulu plays, Earth Spirit and Pandora’s Box.

Wedekind wrote Erdgeist, usually translated as Earth Spirit, in 1895. He followed it with Die Büchse der Pandora, or Pandora’s Box, in 1904. Both dramas center on Lulu, whose relationships with powerful men and her movement through different social worlds drive the tragic plot.

Pabst’s film combines material from the two plays rather than reproducing either one as a straightforward stage adaptation. Louise Brooks’s performance as Lulu became central to the film’s later reputation, especially after critics and filmmakers renewed interest in it decades after its release.

The title can cause confusion with the Greek myth. Wedekind borrowed the Pandora image as a metaphor, but the film is a modern European drama about Lulu, not an ancient-myth adaptation.