„Gone with the Wind” according to Siegoczyński, „A Troubled Nursing Home” by Buszewicz, „So Young” by Maxwell, „Child In a Situation”, the 33rd Festival and „Comedywriting”. It is going to be an intensive, 2026/2027 season

In the upcoming 2026/2027 season, we will continue to perform intensively on two temporary stages during the historic modernization, and we will present several first presentations and Polish premieres.

The repertoire includes, among others, „A Troubled Nursing Home” by Michał Buszewicz, directed by Tomasz Man, „Gone with the Wind” according to Michał Siegoczyński, „So Young” by Douglas Maxwell, directed by Jarosław Tumidajski and a new presentation in the „Child In a Situation” project. The new season means also the 33rd edition of International Festival of Plays Pleasant And Unpleasant and settlement of the 8th edition of „Comedywriting” competition.      

A season of challenges behind us, and new productions ahead of us 

- The 2025/2026 season in Powszechny Theatre in Łódź was marked by intensity and challenges – not only creative, but also organizational. We have launched the strategic, largest infrastructure investment in the history of Powszechny Theatre in Łódź and the City of Łódź has been strongly supporting us in all our efforts. Following the condition assessment of the walls and foundations commissioned by the general contractor, Budimex, demolition works were necessary. We have received assurance from Budimex that the walls will start rising in the coming months. I believe the most challenging and critical moment of the investment, as well as the hardest conversations with the contractor, are already behind us – Ewa Pilawska, the Powszechny Theatre director, says.

 - This last season we played on two temporary stages – we had to learn new spaces, adapt our repertory performances to them, and get used to it. We miss our place at 21  Legionów Street, but constructing a building is a bit like bringing a child into the world. The period of expectation, birth, coming of age, and tender upbringing are all reflected in a beautiful, fully realized human being. We are enjoying this wonderful adventure of building the new Theatre, and we know that once the investment is complete, the new Powszechny Theatre will bring joy to future generations of viewers – Ewa Pilawska emphasizes. 

- Last season held many unknowns, but – what was most important – we managed to save the fabric of the theatre, our community, and our bond with the audience. This was perhaps the most difficult season for the Theatre, which is why I thank you, our audience, for being with us in such large numbers during this time; for being together. It was extremely touching when the companies and theatre directors visiting this year’s International Festival of Plays Pleasant And Unpleasant said after the performances and long meetings with the creators: „You have a fantastic, discerning audience at the festival!”. You were our partner and co-creator of this season, for which I thank you warmly. Your „hunger” for meetings and conversations is the best motivation for creativity – Ewa Pilawska notices.

 - For the 2026/2027 season, I invite you to premieres and first presentations, diverse in theme and varied in aesthetic. I have invited directors to stage plays that address contemporary global issues, reflect on the human condition across different age groups, and show new paths. We will keep moving across a broad spectrum of comedy, convinced that in the theatre it is not the genre, but the quality that determines artistic value. We begin with „A Troubled Nursing Home” by Michał Buszewicz, directed by Tomasz Man. Then Jarosław Tumidajski will direct Polish first presentation of „So Young” by a Scottish playwright Douglas Maxwell.  We will meet with Michał Siegoczyński, who will prepare a brand new version of „Gone with the Wind”. We invite you also to another new presentation in the „Child In a Situation” project – this time it will be „Tough Case”, written by David Craig. There will also be new presentations in the „Reading theatre for the blind and partially sighted persons” project and in the beginning of 2027 we will have the 33rd edition of International Festival of Plays Pleasant And Unpleasant. I invite you to Powszechny Theatre in Łódź – Ewa Pilawska says.        

Old age is a state of mind, not a matter of chronology. „A Troubled Nursing Home” by Buszewicz

On November 2026 we invite you to the first presentation of „A Troubled Nursing Home” by Michał Buszewicz, directed by Tomasz Man.

„A Troubled Nursing Home” is a humorous, subversive tale about people who refuse to let their lives be defined by age-related stereotypes. Everything starts with the idea of co-housing, which is the shared living of older adults who consciously decide to live under one roof. They set up a sort of commune to prove to themselves and others that old age is a state of mind, not a matter of a birth certificate.

 - I chose this text because Buszewicz does not write about old age with pity or on his knees – he writes with anarchic humor and shameless vitality. We have flesh-and-blood people here who, instead of quietly waiting for the end, prefer to raise hell, live life on their own terms, and fight for every second of closeness. Imagine that instead of quietly living out their days with tea and knitting, a crew of sixty-year-olds says, „Oh no, we are not going to play that game”. They are throwing out old furniture, knocking down walls, and turning an old villa into a wacky senior co-housing commune – director Tomasz Man says.

In his play Buszewicz addresses the themes of passing time and taming death, not as overcoming the fear of the inevitable, but rather as asserting the right to live life on one’s own terms. – Michał Buszewicz wrote a play about how to give boredom and loneliness the slip. There is snorting powdered buddy through the nose just to try it, arguing over whether dying in a crossword puzzle goes vertically or horizontally, meditating on a single piece of Beskidzki pretzel stick, and having an absolute lack of shame when the urge for a little romance strikes. It is pure, brilliant, wildly absurd humour and an absolute blast of energy in defiance of getting older – Man notices.

- This is a spectacle for anyone who is sick of polite, sanitized thinking about old age! Older people will get a powerful boost of courage and a sign that at a certain age you really do not have to do anything—and you can do everything. Younger people will smile and realize that beneath the gray hair, their parents or grandparents have the exact same fire, party hunger, and absolute lack of desire to be „well-behaved retirees”. Brilliant, shamelessly play for anyone who values detachment, truth, and a healthy dose of laughs in the theatre – the spectacle’s director emphasizes.

The rehearsals began in July. Anetta Piekarska-Man is working on stage design, Artur Dobrzański – choreography and Zuzanna Piekarska-Opara is preparing the video projections. The cast includes Monika Kępka, Diana Krupa, Ewa Sonnenburg, Magda Zając-Zawadzka, Beata Ziejka, Sebastian Jasnoch, Jakub Kryształ, Piotr Lauks, Artur Majewski and Adam Marjański.

Understanding begins when we stop looking down on others – „So Young” by Maxwell, directed by Tumidajski

On 5 February, 2027, we will have the first Polish presentation of „So Young”  by a Scottish playwright Douglas Maxwell, translated by Elżbieta Woźniak and directed by Jarosław Tumidajski. A hallmark of Maxwell’s work is his use of humour as a tool to address human tragedies with detachment. The audience is often led to laugh, only to be confronted moments later with themes of grief, loneliness, or the breakdown of relationships. The author himself lists love, loss, exclusion, social class, and the hope for redemption as the main themes of his plays.

 The play is set in the summer of 2021, right after the end of the pandemic lockdown. A reunion of three best friends after a period of forced restrictions becomes an opportunity to confront the painful experiences of recent months and to ask whether the actions of one of them who is trying to rebuild his life mean a betrayal and nullification of everything that once bound them together.

 - In „So Young” Douglas Maxwell explores stereotypes – both those about the young and those who have a lot more experience behind them. It is a play about an encounter between generations that, instead of confirming easy assumptions about each other, constantly undermines them – director Jarosław Tumidajski says.

 - Youth is not a synonym for naivety, just as maturity does not guarantee wisdom and infallibility. Each character brings their own baggage of experiences, fears, and illusions, and their confrontation leads to the gradual breakdown of simple judgments and prejudices. This is a story about how true understanding only begins when we stop looking at another person through the lens of age and are ready to see them as someone much more complex than we previously assumed – Tumidajski emphasizes.

 - It is also a play about loss and grief, about the fact that there is no single right way to experience it. Everyone says goodbye to their loved ones differently, everyone tries to rebuild their world anew. This is a story about how you cannot win against the most painful experiences, nor can you erase them. You can only learn to live with them. Because memory can be a burden, but it is also the only way to save those who have passed on – provided we do not cling desperately to the past, but allow that past to become a part of us and our… future. And that is precisely why this is also – or perhaps above all – a story about love and hope.

Douglas Maxwell
„So Young” („Taka młoda”)
Translated by Elżbieta Woźniak
Directed by Jarosław Tumidajski
Stage design: Justyna Elminowska
Costumes: Krystian Szymczak
Light: Katarzyna Łuszczyk
Cast: Beata Ziejka, Jakub Kotyński, Arkadiusz Wójcik, Ada Grodzka (guest appearance, student at the Aleksander Zelwerowicz National Academy of Dramatic Art in Warsaw)

The Łódź Scarlett O’Hara – „Gone with the Wind” according to Siegoczyński

At the end of the season Powszechny Theatre in Łódź invites you to the premiere presentation of „Gone with the Wind”, adapted and directed by Michał Siegoczyński 

The director, known to the Łódź audience thanks to „I Wanted To Be”, „Brancz”, „lovebook” and „First love, then shoot”, uses the language of film, music, and pop culture codes in his stage productions, combining them with classic stories that he rewrites to question their meaning for the contemporary audience. He is once again reaching into a work deeply rooted in the collective imagination. This time, his starting point is the story of Scarlett O’Hara—a character who, for generations, has symbolized strength, determination, and refusal to accept defeat. In Siegoczyński’s adaptation „Gone with the Wind” will not be a love story against the backdrop of the American Civil War. The director is primarily interested in the moment when the familiar order of the world falls apart before the characters’ eyes, and they must learn to live in a world governed by new rules.

- Can „Gone with the Wind” become a mirror today, reflecting our present times? Are we actually just retelling the same stories that happened before? Perhaps today’s Scarlett O’Hara can finally retell her story and find her happiness and peace in the arms of her beloved? „Gone with the Wind” catches the world at a moment when everything we know is just ending, and what is to come is unknown. Could this sentence equally well describe the world that currently surrounds us in 2027? Here, on the Powszechny Theatre stage, the characters of a long-ago story will try to cheat fate destiny once again – director Michał Siegoczyński says. 

 „Gone With the Wind” („Przeminęło z wiatrem”)

Script: Michał Siegoczyński

Directed by Michał Siegoczyński
Stage design: Justyna Elminowska
Costumes: Sylwester Krupiński
Cast: Nel Kaczmarek (guest appearance), Diana Krupa, Beata Ziejka, Sebastian Jasnoch, Michał Lacheta, Paulina Nadel, Kamil Suszczyk, Aleksandra Bogulewska, Karolina Łukaszewicz, Artur Majewski. 

The idea of restorative justice in the „Child in a Situation” project

 In the new season, the Theatre will continue its original project „Child in a Situation” (all project spectatles are directed by Ewa Pilawska on a voluntary basis). The project has for years addressed important social issues and the themes that young people face during adolescence. The sixteenth premiere of the series will be „Tough Case” by David S. Craig.

- The play by a Canadian author explores the idea of „restorative justice” and raises questions about responsibility, guilt, and forgiveness. The story of 16-year-old Dane, who commits an act of vandalism to gain his colleagues’ approval, shows how severe the consequences of a seemingly minor act can be and how it can alter the lives of many people. It also reminds us that repairing harm does not begin with punishment, but with a sincere conversation and taking responsibility for one’s own decisions – Ewa Pilawska says.

„Tough Case” is a story about how forgiveness requires courage, openness, empathy, and a willingness to listen to another person, and how true change is only possible when we try to understand the other side.

The 33rd International Festival of Plays Pleasant And Unpleasant 

The 33rd International Festival of Plays Pleasant And Unpleasant will be one of the most important events of the season. It is one of the most important theatre festivals in Poland, showing the most interesting phenomena of contemporary theatre for years, initiating important discussions, and serving as a meeting place for artists and audiences from all over the country.

 Call for entries for the „Comedywriting” competition is open

 In early 2027 we will also learn the prizewinners of the 8th „Comedywriting” nationwide competition. The competition organized by the Polish Comedy Centre supports the development of new Polish comedy drama and encourages authors to explore themes close to the modern audience. Comedy is a genre that is not confined merely to entertainment, but serves as a tool for commenting on reality just as effective as any other theatrical forms. Humour, on the other hand, allows us to look at social changes and human relationships from a distance, without diminishing their weight and significance. On the contrary, it helps us discuss difficult and important issues in a way that reaches a wide audience.

Entries for the competition can be submitted to Teatr Powszechny w Łodzi until the end of October 2026. Detailed terms and conditions of the competition are available on the Teatr Powszechny w Łodzi website under the Polish Centre of Comedy tab.