They were called “traitors to the country”, “collaborators”, and “renegades”. Their crime was maintaining intimate relationships with German soldiers during the occupation. Actresses, singers, cinema and cabaret stars. Did they really deserve the infamy and punishment meted out by the underground? What was their motivation? Do we have a moral right to judge them today?
The play, by director Jędrzej Piaskowski and playwright Magda Fertacz, is an attempt to examine the issue of treason and collaborationism from the perspective of personal memory. The script is partly based on the life of Maria Malicka, a famous pre-war Warsaw actress for whom the theatre at 8 Marszałkowska Street was built. Accused of having collaborated with the Germans, the artist was banned from performing in Warsaw after the war. Another inspiration for the play is Arletty, or Leonie Bathiat, a famous French film and theatre actress of the 1930s and 1940s. She had had wartime liaisons with German officers and was later imprisoned before relaunching her international career. And lastly, the story of Deutsches Filmtheater which operated during the German occupation of Poland in the building of Teatr Rozmaitości, as well as Mon Café, the establishment in Aleje Jerozolimskie before and during WWII frequented by Warsaw’s homosexuals.
Runtime: 90 mins
The event is part of the 23rd Theatre Confrontations Festival >>>