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2 September 2010

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Werner Schwab, "Holy Mothers", directed by Grzegorz Wiśniewski
Directed by Grzegorz Wiśniewski, Powszechny Theatre in Warsaw, December 2001.
languages: Polski  / English 
 

Werner Schwab is one of Austria's most famous playwrights, second only to Thomas Bernhard in popularity. In his scandalous dramas, he criticizes bourgeois mentality and experiments with language. "HOLY MOTHERS" as staged at Warsaw's Powszechny Theatre by Grzegorz Wiśniewski is the second Polish production of this work. The first was that of Krystian Lupa at the Stary Theatre in Kraków.

The Holy Mothers of the title are three middle-aged women whose lives revolve around a newly purchased television set. They babble on about the Pope, Providence, life, and the meaning of the world. The audience is given the opportunity to observe the relationships existing between them and their ceaseless efforts at dominating each other - efforts that culminate in aggression.
"In setting this scandalous scene", write the creators of the Warsaw production, "Schwab tries to provoke the audience into rejecting stereotypes. He prompts us to look more closely at the people we usually pass with indifference and look upon with disgust. Within the heroines' fantasies, which are grotesquely melodramatic in spite of being vulgar in form, he forces us to recognize the dreams that are common to us all: dreams of changing one's life, of a different, better, more beautiful destiny. Dreams about that bit of warmth and understanding, happiness and love."
The production features performances by Ewa Dałkowska, Elżbieta Kępińska, and Joanna Żółkowska.
"Director Grzegorz Wiśniewski has focused on the psychological workings of the main characters, compromising the expressive potential of the play. As interpreted by him, 'Holy Mothers' is an intimate study of the loneliness felt by three middle-aged women who failed to find fulfillment as mothers and as lovers. The one man remaining in their life is the Pope, speaking to them via television.

(...) Ewa Dałkowska, Joanna Żółkowska and Elżbieta Kępińska are excellent as three seniors who long for a different life. However, they use their art in an unjust cause, namely, to defend the heroines they play. Dalkowska is so convincing in portraying Maria's religious fervor as she scrubs toilets that we are inclined to feel compassion for her. Kępińska as Erna is one of those old ladies we would love to walk across the street. Even Żółkowska's Greta, dressed like a hooker in a wig and faux leather, hits a note of sympathy when she gushes over her dog, her only friend. The Warsaw production fails to make clear why these kind-hearted retirees are pushed, in the end, to murder Maria."
Werner Schwab, "PREZYDENTKI" / "HOLY MOTHERS", translated by Monika Muskała, directed by Grzegorz Wiśniewski, production design by Barbara Hanicka. Premiere: December 8, 2001 at the Powszechny Theatre in Warsaw.
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