Pawłowski, Łukasz

„War is us. War is Poland. There would be no Poland without war”. It all starts with innocent childhood games back in the yard. We’re full of war, fed by it at home and at school, from which we graduate already carrying a martyrological burden. Politicians have been creating the community and identity of our nation for a long time, preying on the common belief that Poland is predestined to be „Christ of all nations”. Łukasz Pawłowski scrutinizes the idea of „holy war” as well as the ethos and image of Polish soldier.

– from Gdynia Drama Award website

Pawłowski analyzes the image of Polish war hero, proving that this heroism is no more than a false construct embedded in Polish society’s DNA. His world is populated by zombielike characters straight from a horror movie – saint Maximilian Kolbe, officer Pilecki, Bruce Willis from Armageddon, Kunta Kinte from Roots […] Metro Afghanistan’s final resembles low-budget gore movie, a genre laced with grotesque cruelty, with which Pawłowski plays. I haven’t read many brazen, truly daring and even rebellious plays in a long time. While Poland celebrates its narration of „raising from its knees” and its former heroism, immersed in blood of the perished, „stoning” them to their another death by monuments and memorial sites, such subversive play as Metro Afghanistan seems like a living nightmare for the rulers. I can’t wait for the premiere.

– Jacek Wakar, introductory essay to Polska jest mitem. Nowe dramaty – Polish contemporary drama anthology

A dense and gloomy family drama at the centre of which is the mother. Her husband, their three daughters and lovers and husbands are people caught up in something strange that holds this family together: betrayals, lies, denials and a tree that grows in the living room. In this drama, the author sketches various psychological portraits and complicated arrangements. The father, who for years "fails to notice" his wife's infidelity and naively confuses love with a morbid addiction, and after her death decides not to get out of bed, obsessively waiting for his own death. A younger sister, Su, aggressive and addicted to sex, who as a child was a silent observer of her mother's summer indiscretions; Su's lover, addicted to her and slowly getting absorbed into the family; Meg and Piotr's marriage, based on silence and deception. Mutual hatred and desperate attempts at forgiveness. Dissolving relationships and a crippling loneliness. A sense of meaningless existence expressed in suggestive language:

The open construction of this drama allows for different stories to be composed - the author points out that the sequence of scenes can be freely chosen. And just as the editing in the film can completely change its tone, so the director has the opportunity to put different accents and create different chronologies of events. The stuffy atmosphere marked by family dramas will be the axis of the plot anyway. Pawłowski's play resembles Bergman's famous Whispers and Cries and undoubtedly gives the actors and the director great opportunities for creative explorations.