„I hate” – Peter Čižmár, Divadlo Kontra Theatre SLOVAKIA

“I Hate”, a monodrama by Peter Čižmár, performed by Divadlo Kontra Theatre from Slovakia, directed by Klaudyna Rozhin

October 19th (Sunday) 6:30 PM  / Stage in Shed

“Nienawidzę” is a portrait of a frustrated intellectual – a teacher who struggles with the surrounding reality, somewhat like Don Quixote fighting windmills, failing to see that the source of his frustrations lies within himself.

The monodrama is an intimate confession of an overly sensitive man who has lost his way in the new reality. One foot is still stuck in the remnants of communism, the other – in wild capitalism. This split proves to be uncomfortable for him, even painful.

The play clearly echoes Marek Koterski’s cult films, and the protagonist is none other than Adaś Miauczyński, known from those films:

“Incoherent and defeated, a rather likable whining loser, more a product of circumstances than their creator, (…) passive, yet full of grievances against life.” – this is how the author characterizes his hero.

The hardest thing is to survive the next five minutes.
Life – that is the next five minutes.
Most often, one has to move something from one place to another,
and then back to the same place, stand up, sit down, walk, react.
And yet, there is no other life than the next five minutes. The rest is imagination.

— Sławomir Mrożek, “Little Letters”

Tomasz Miłkowski on the performance in his article: “Adaś Miauczyński is a Slovak.”

Divadlo Kontra was founded in January 2007 by Klaudyna Rozhin, a Polish-born, UK based director and translator, and Peter Čižmár, an actor from the Spiss region. Our goal, right from the very beginning, was to stage Slovak premieres of the most exciting new foreign plays, as well as new interpretations of world classics, and to present them to widest possible audiences, both in Slovakia and abroad.

PETER ČIŽMÁR – co-founder, leading actor and spiritus movens of Divadlo Kontra.
Winner of Event of the Season 2007 for Howie the Rookie and Theatre of the Season 2018 and 2019 with Divadlo Kontra; recipient of the Nova Drama Surprise Award at the Nova Drama Festival 2007 in Bratislava for his performance in Howie the Rookie; Best Actor Awards at the Albamono Festival 2017 in Albania for Macbeth and at the Kopriva Festival in the Czech Republic for Stones in His Pockets (2010) and Hamlet (2012); Audience Award for The Woman in Black (Kopriva 2014); City of Wrocław Award at the WROSTJA Festival 2015 for Macbeth; Best Duo Award for Stones in His Pockets at the Sankryza Festival 2018 in Lithuania; as well as three Golden Skulls and the Golden Recognition at the 17th and 21st Gdańsk Shakespeare Festival for Hamlet. For his performance in the monodrama I Hate he received the Stan Radič Award – Event of the Year at the Kremnica Gags Festival 2013.
KLAUDYNA ROZHIN – director, translator, pedagogue, co-founder and artistic director of Divadlo Kontra. A graduate of Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin and the University of Hull in the UK. She has lived in the UK for over 25 years, where she has been associated with many theatres including Plymouth Theatre Royal, the Royal National Theatre, Bristol Old Vic, and Bath Theatre Royal, as well as with universities and arts colleges such as Exeter University, Bath Spa University, Dartington College of Arts, University of the West of England, and Bretton Hall College. She has also collaborated with GITIS Scandinavia in Denmark and with Włodzimierz Staniewski’s Centre for Theatre Practices “Gardzienice.”

fot. Marcin Butryn