The Nobel Prize-winning Belgian dramatist Maurice Maeterlinck (1862–1949) lives in the contemporary memory chiefly for his labyrinthine faux-medieval romance Pelléas et Mélisande as set to music by Claude Debussy (1862–1918). In 2017, the Deutsche Oper, Berlin, premiered a Friday the Thirteen trifecta of Maeterlinck playlets as adapted by Aribert Reimann (1936–2024), the composer of a Lear as bleak and harrowing as Shakespeare’s tragedy. Now it’s Frankfurt’s turn to dive into Reimann’s dark waters. The opening vignette revolves around a new mother at death’s door following a difficult birth. The second plays out in the wake of a suicide. A wicked queen dominates the third with her scheme to get rid of an inconvenient grandson. Expect shivers. —Matthew Gurewitsch