"Optimist’s Testament"

Text: Sławomir Mrożek “Testament optymisty”
Direction and choreography: Dominika Knapik
Dramaturgy: Wojtek Klimczyk
Performers: Dominika Knapik, Magdalena Przybysz, Tomasz Chołoniewski
Sound advisor: Anna Szwajgier
Production: Łaźnia Nowa Theatre, Kraków
Duration: 40 min.

“Optimist’s Testament” is a minimalistic dance theatre performance inspired by absurd and ironic short story by Sławomir Mrożek. The piece evokes the atmosphere of Aki Kaurismäki’s movies which are equally ironic. Performers not only talk (very little, actually) and move (quite a lot) but also sing and play songs which are a kind of inner monologues of the characters, natural born losers. All this turns the show (which becomes a “concert-wake” as if the dead were brought back to life to play on their own funeral) into multilayered narration treating of death in a subtle, indirect, non- melodramatic way and presented with deadpan humor.

Premiere: 17.02.2011, Łaźnia Nowa Theater, Krakow

Presentations:

Łaźnia Nowa Theater, Krakow
Politics of Dance 2011, Theatre Institute, Warsaw
AURA International Dance Festival 2011, Kaunas

"Optimist’s Testament"

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