A group of seven actors have devised and are rehearsing a play about the 18th century precursor of hypnosis, Mesmer. Things start to go wrong when one of the actors has to drop out and the director steps into her shoes. Not only that, but the leading actor playing Mesmer, was once a well-known television actor, and resents her direction and stirs up trouble with the rest of the cast, and when the play within a play develops, not only does this lead to some hilarious mishaps, the Mesmer play also parallels some of the actors’ lives, resulting in some entertaining revelations.

As the Mesmer play progresses, showing Mesmer’s dramatic cure of a blind pianist leading to a scandal that rocked the Viennese court, and Mesmer’s escape to Paris in the throes of the French Revolution, the rehearsal becomes more fraught as the leading actor’s past catches up with him.

Because The Franz Anton Mesmer Show is a two-act play set in a real-time rehearsal, it is possible to perform the play in almost any venue, using a simply staged setting.