Rehearsals of "Ferragosto" - the play dedicated to Gustaw Herling Grudziński

In Powszechny Theatre in Łódź we have just started the rehearsals of  “Ferragosto” – the play by Radosław Paczocha, directed by Adam Orzechowski. The first preview of it will take place during the 25th edition of International Festival of Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant. The play is dedicated to Gustaw Herling-Grudziński – this year we will celebrate the 100th anniversary of his birth.  

Gustaw Herling-Grudziński was born 100 years ago – on 20 May, 1919. He was a writer, essayist, critic, journalist, soldier, a gulag prisoner (arrested by NKVD – Soviet secret police – after the Soviet Union had invaded Poland in September 1939). For the whole period of communism in Poland Herling-Grudziński lived abroad as a political emigrant. He wrote novels and short stories, among others the best known “A World Apart” as well as “The Tower”, “Journal Written at Night” (several parts), “The Second Coming” and “The Bell-Ringer’s Toll”. During the times of Polish People’s Republic any information on Herling-Grudziński was strictly censored and his name was put on a special list of writers never to be published. His works became widely known and appreciated in Poland only after 1989.

“Ferragosto” is the second play co-created by Radosław Paczocha and Adam Orzechowski in Powszechny Theatre in Łódź. “Tango Łódź” – their first joint work – was honoured as  The Best Perfomance in the Audience Plebiscite of the 22nd edition of International Festival of Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant.           

“Ferragosto”
By Radosław Paczocha
Directed by: Adam Orzechowski
Music: Marcin Nenko
Set design and costumes: Magdalena Gajewska
Cast: Przemysław Chojęta, Jarosław Dziedzic, Karolina Krawczyńska, Diana Krupa, Michał Lacheta, Karolina Łukaszewicz, Paulina Nadel, Angelika Olszewska, Arkadiusz Wójcik, Magdalena Zając-Zawadzka, Artur Zawadzki