"Hannah Arendt: The Escape" - master presentation at TopOFFFestival in Tychy
TopOFFFestival in Tychy has been the meeting place of main alternative Polish theatres. This year’s edition of the Festival was concluded on 13 April by master presentation of the spectacle “Hannah Arendt: The Escape” directed by Grzegorz Laszuk. The play was co-produced by Powszechny Theatre in Łódź and Komuna Warszawa.
The spectacle premiered during the 24th edition of International Festival of Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant. It was co-produced by Powszechny Theatre in Łódź and Komuna Warszawa – one of the most important independent theatres in Poland. – I am very glad this spectacle has been co-produced by two different partners. Komuna Warszawa is an active, small, non-governmental theatre. Powszechny Theatre has been a big institution. Our common production was suggested by director Ewa Pilawska – it shows her openness and courage in looking for new ways of expression as well as seeking partners outside institutional theatre which seldom happens in Polish theatre system – said Grzegorz Laszuk in an interview with Izabella Adamczewska for “Gazeta Wyborcza” before the first preview of the play.
“Hannah Arendt…” was recognized by the “Polityka” weekly as one 10 best performances of 2018. It was also placed in the group of seven finalists of Energy of Culture – the plebiscite for the most important cultural event in Łódź in 2018.
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The play is a fantasy about people who are close to each other and their meeting in a special historic moment, during WW2. Hannah Arendt, Martin Heidegger, Karl Jaspers and Walter Benjamin – they all had to stand the test of moral responsibility and find a way of escape from death. Hannah Arendt, a Jewish-German philosopher, escaped from Germany to France after the Nazis came to power in 1933. She left occupied France for the USA at the last moment. She survived. Later she became a professor of Chicago and New York universities and one of the most famous world researchers of totalitarianism.
„Hannah Arendt: The Escape”
Co-production of Powszechny Theatre in Łódź and Komuna Warszawa
Directed by: Grzegorz Laszuk
MUsic: Bartek Rączkowski
Choreography: Renata Piotrowska-Auffret
Video: Adrian Cognac
Costumes: Ewelina Ciuchta
Set design: Piotr Szczygielski
Light: Karolina Gębska
Co-operation: Paweł Mościcki
Cast: Anna Wojnarowska, Małgorzata Goździk, Michał Lacheta, Arkadiusz Wójcik
