Gerhart Hauptmann is a popular German writer, playwright and poet who taught wide popularity not only in Europe, but also in Russia already at the beginning of the 20th century. The drama "Before the Sun Rises" tells the story of a farmer's family who got rich on the sale of coal Hoffmann Krause will soon have an heir To help her pregnant sister, Elena returns to the parental home and is horrified: financial well-being has led the Krause family to degeneration and alcoholism. Suddenly Hoffman visits a friend of youth - Alfred Lot - a convinced sober man and an intellectual, with whom it seems that Elena will be able to escape from the hated village