Inspired by Karol Zbyszewski's doctoral thesis Niemcewicz from front and back (1939), this is a mono-performance about the last King of Poland, Stanislaw Poniatowski, as told by different people, from the King's courtiers to the Russian Empress Catherine II.It is a story whose relevance is reflected in today's realities.
The monodrama focuses on eighteenth-century Poland just before the country's collapse. In the novel, based on his doctoral thesis, Karol Zbyszewski ridicules politicians, the clergy and the army from opposing camps, not forgetting the king and Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz, the author of the first Polish political comedy, Powrót posła ('The Return of the Deputy', 1791). Zbyszewski ridicules the indiscriminate drinking, laziness, carelessness, the fondness for empty slogans and gestures, false religiosity, political mistakes and other vices, highlighting the responsibility of society as a whole for the divisions in Poland. This stage adaptation of Zbyszewski's novel provides a panorama of the macabre world of madmen described by the author and ruled by the main character, the king.
The actor Mateusz Nowak won the "Best Young Artist" award at the Saint Muse International Theatre Festival in Mongolia, the prize for the best male actor at the Albamono International Monodrama Festival in Albania and the special prize at the Thespis International Monodrama Festival in Germany for his performance in the role.
