„The King and the Tsarina” – The Polish Classics Theatre

“The King and the Tsarina” – The Polish Classics Theatre

Directed by: Jerzy Zelnik

Cast: Halina Rowicka, Jerzy Zelnik, Stefan Kiniorski

October 17th (Saturday) 7 PM  / Stage in Palace

The romance of the last Polish king with Empress Catherine the Great was no secret. It was thanks to the Russian ruler that the monarch ascended the throne in Warsaw. The Polish Classics Theatre invites you to the performance “The King and the Tsarina”, directed by Jerzy Zelnik, based on a selection of correspondence between Empress Catherine and King Stanisław August.

The premiere took place on March 9, 2024, at the House of Creative Work in Radziejowice.

In 1755, the secretary of the British envoy, a young Polish aristocrat named Stanisław Antoni Poniatowski, arrived in St. Petersburg. He caught Catherine’s attention—while he himself fell hopelessly in love with her. Her husband, Peter, discovered the affair. He reacted with anger but soon mastered it. He himself had extramarital relationships, and so he blessed the lovers’ happiness. In July 1762, however, he met his death—at the order of his wife, who had him murdered. Two years later, now as Empress, Catherine made Stanisław Poniatowski the ruler of Poland. Thirty-one years after that, she deprived him not so much of his throne as of his entire kingdom, orchestrating the Third Partition of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth.

The creators present a psychological and emotional portrait of the king and the empress—former lovers who, under the guise of maintaining sibling-like relations, wage a diplomatic war over conflicting national ambitions and aims. Echoes of past passion sometimes still resound between the lines of their letters. Yet it is brutal political interest—devoid of sentiment—that forms the true content of this correspondence. That is why it provides such extraordinary material for actors. In the production of the Polish Classics Theatre, they bring out the full complexity of the relationship between Stanisław August and Catherine II, a dramatic web of longing, hope, fear, contempt, and cold calculation. “The King and the Tsarina” unveils the backstage of events that led to the disappearance of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth from the map of Europe for more than 120 years.

Creative team:
Director: Jerzy Zelnik
Script: Halina Rowicka
Set and Costume Design: Anna Czyż
Music: Mikołaj Hertel
Lighting Design: Marcin Jaczkowski
Make-up: Anna Czyżykiewicz
Stage Manager: Barbara Ojrzeńska
Production: Monika Siereńska, Natalia PrzyborekCast:
Halina Rowicka: The Tsarina
Jerzy Zelnik: The King
Stefan Kiniorski: The Violinist, Stańczyk

fot. Marcin Butryn