Midway through the 1990s, the murder of Jolanta Brzozowska shocked all of Warsaw and much of Poland, feeding the sensation-hungry media. The public was calling for the lynching of the youthful murderers, turning their vilest hate at Monika Osińska, aka Osa (Wasp): a pretty, well-dressed, articulate, and confident soon-to-be grammar school graduate. She was not the one to carry out the heinous act, yet she was believed to have guided the hands of her two male accomplices. And it was she who bore the brunt of the public’s wrath. Monika Osińska was sentenced to life imprisonment. She was paroled having served 27 years behind bars. The late, distinguished reporter Lidia Ostałowska began writing a book about Osa, yet she never finished it, as her line of reasoning diverged from her subject’s expectations. Eventually, the story was taken up by Wojciech Tochman, who produced his devastating Historia na śmierć i życie (literally: “A Story for Death and Life”). The book became the foundation for the mesmerizing production by Natalia Korczakowska at the Studio Theatre in Warsaw.
Polowanie na osy. Historia na śmierć i życie / Wasp Hunting. A Matter of Death and Life is truly uncompromising theatre, even if it does not renounce tenderness. Far from moralising, being accusatory at times, it is far from obvious. The stage of the Studio is set with a giant cage/prison, a TV studio, and a refrigerator by the grille wall. Everything boiled down to a single shot, the reduced world Osa (played by Wiktoria Kruszczyńska) experiences after sentencing and awaiting sentencing. Giant screens on either side of the stage show close-ups of the actors’ faces, right down to such detail as the beads of sweat glistening on their temples. This is not mere cinematic trickery, reinforcing the effect obtained. It serves reducing the distance between us and the characters: the idea is to make us nearly creep into their skin, and glean the sense of no escape from yourself and your circumstances. The power of Korczakowska’s production also lies in building an almost intimate connection with the story and its characters and actors, while retaining an epic dimension of the narrative. The performances from the young Wiktoria Kruszczyńska, Maja Pankiewicz, Dominika Ostałowska, and the entire company of the Studio are magnificent. An unforgettable and unignorable voice against life sentences.
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Photos by Natalia Kabanow
