"Waiting Room.0"

On Monday 24 March in Wytwórnia Club we saw another play in the XX International Festival of Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant. This time it was „Waiting Room. 0”, presented by Polish Theatre in Wrocław and directed by Krystian Lupa.

The action is set in a waiting room of a deserted railway station. Some passengers got off the night express train because someone announced a need to change. They found themselves in a shared, timeless, undefined and undetermined space. There are people of different characters and types there, people waiting to leave the place.They have to survive in the waiting room and to confront other members of the temporary microcommunity. What is the result? What does it tell us about man?

Tiredness, confinement, feeling of being lost, confusion, stress, fury – when connected with individual human characteristics and interrelations they create certain situations that make up a heterogeneous, restless story. The story is based on the observation of a man and a „demon” that leaves him in a certain situation. The observation is realized in different levels. The spectators observe the actors, the actors observe the spectators and the whole situation in the waiting room is observed by two men who are hidden in a small office in the back of the station building – they comment on the passengers’ behaviour, they add thoughts, intentions, they suggest dreams… They act as if from the outside but they are part of reality.

The meeting after the show was moderated by Łukasz Drewniak. Krystian Lupa told about making of the play and its expression. He explained that it was assumed that „Waiting Room. 0” was not and is not a clear, firm message. It is rather an open form for which the spectators have to find their own meaning. It is not necessary to understand the play’s narrative. – I myself do not know the director who sends young artists to visit Auschwitz – said Lupa referring to one of the play’s motives. – I would like the spectators to find their own solutions here – he said.

During the meeting there was a discussion about the performance of Woodcutters by Thomas Bernhard (directed by Lupa) which was supposed to be presented by the Schauspielhaus in Graz during the Festival. It had to be cancelled due to a conflict between one of the actresses and the director – she refused to play in his homeland.

Thank you for your presence!