Divine Comedy 2025 is not only about performances. It’s also about live conversations. And even if you’re still hunting for tickets, you can join the festival anyway – because all debates and talks are free. And who knows, maybe you’ll run into Mery Spolsky there?

This year, Divine Comedy offers even more room for reflection. The accompanying programme – talks, panels, debates, heated discussions – has grown into something that could easily be called a festival within the festival. Most importantly: many events are open to everyone, including those who don’t hold tickets for any show. You can simply walk in, sit down, and listen. And the themes – echoing the core motifs of the performances – resonate with the most pressing problems of today’s world.

This year’s festival theme, “barbarism,” leads audiences toward stories of fear and otherness, symbolic violence and hope – toward the question of whether coexistence is still possible. To illuminate this context, the festival opens with a powerful conversation between philosopher and writer Prof. Remigiusz Ryziński, Prof. Monika Płatek, the festival’s artistic director and author of the theme borrowed from Cavafy – Bartosz Szydłowski – as well as Mery Spolsky (singer, but also anglicist and American studies scholar) and philosopher and therapist Cveta Dmitrova. Together, they will ask who the “barbarian” is today, who benefits from cultivating fear, and whether a stage for human encounter free of prejudice can still be restored. Few topics feel more urgent – and few groups of speakers better suited to explore them.

The programme also features conversations about the body – a theme that pulses through this year’s festival both onstage and off. Agata Araszkiewicz from the Laboratoires d’Études Féminines et du Genre at Université Paris 8 will lead a discussion on why the body has become a focal point of today’s conflicts, hopes, emancipations and anxieties. She will be joined by artist Kle Mens, Prof. Remigiusz Ryziński, performer Arti Grabowski, and writer Agnieszka Szpila, author of Heksy. This is a conversation about new intimacies, gender politics and desire – about how art responds to the shifting experience of embodiment.

Speaking of bodies: this year, Kraków will host one of the most provocative artists of the contemporary stage – Florentina Holzinger. After her performance, the festival invites audiences to an open meeting with her and her team of performers. No tickets, with translation into three languages. For many viewers, this will be a rare opportunity to confront her artistic vision up close.

As every year, Divine Comedy also turns its attention to the map of Polish identities. The programme includes a discussion on Silesianness – an “otherness” that has shaped Polish narratives about community for decades. Aleksandra Klich will host a conversation with Karolina Pospiszil, Beata Guczalska, Robert Talarczyk and Wojciech Śmieja, where language, pride, feminist perspectives and local experience meet universal questions of home and belonging – especially in a borderland.

Another key event is the talk following the Ukrainian performance “I Did Not Leave Ukraine.” This conversation about borders – both physical and internal – will explore impossible choices and the price one pays for freedom. Michał Olszewski will lead a discussion with Ziemowit Szczerek, Antonina Palarczyk, and Olha Menko, focusing less on military chronicles and more on human consequences of war.

The programme also features an event crucial for theatre professionals: a debate on the role of the theatre producer. Those who have long worked “in-between” – between artists, institutions, budgets, risks and impossible missions – will finally have space to speak about themselves. This event was prepared with specialists from the Theatre Institute, authors of the newest report on this profession, which is only now beginning to be described with due seriousness.

And for those who do hold tickets: Divine Comedy offers a series of post-show conversations with creators. Discussions led by theatre critics will open the creative process, encourage questions and shorten the distance between the stage and the audience.

When, where, what? It’s best to follow the festival website and Facebook events. The programme lives, shifts and keeps adding new layers. Divine Comedy this year truly is divine: open, bold and close to you – the audience.

We invite you.

At a glance

Want to know what this year’s Divine Comedy is about?

Monday, 6 PM, Mirror Hall, Słowacki Theatre
Panel: “Introduction to Barbarism Studies”
Speakers: Prof. Remigiusz Ryziński, Prof. Monika Płatek, Bartosz Szydłowski, Mery Spolsky, Cveta Dmitrova.
A conversation on power, otherness, fear and the possibilities of coexistence in an uncertain world.

The Body – revolution and new scripts of intimacy

Sunday, 1 PM, Bunkier Sztuki
Panel: “The Body – Fever, Spark, Revolution. A New Gender Pact?”
Hosted by Agata Araszkiewicz. Guests include: Prof. Remigiusz Ryziński, Kle Mens, Arti Grabowski, Agnieszka Szpila.
A conversation about the body as a field of freedom, social change and artistic transformation.

Florentina Holzinger in Kraków

Friday, after the performance, approx. 7:30 PM, ICE – foyer
Meeting with one of the most radical artists of contemporary theatre, hosted by Jacek Cieślak.
Open admission.

Tuesday, 6 PM, Mirror Hall, Słowacki Theatre

Panel: “The Coded Silesian Option. Strangeness, Pride, Strength.”
Speakers: Karolina Pospiszil, Beata Guczalska, Robert Talarczyk, Wojciech Śmieja.
Moderator: Aleksandra Klich.
A perspective opening new windows onto Silesian identity.

Poland from Paris – Théâtre/Public on Polish Theatre

Saturday, 6 December, 2 PM, Bunkier Sztuki
Discussion around the newest issue of the French magazine Théâtre/Public (“Polish Scenes”).
Participants include Michał Borczuch, Katarzyna Kalwat, Michał Telega, Christophe Triau, Agnieszka Zgieb.
Moderator: Tomasz Domagała.

Ukraine – a conversation on borders, darkness and impossible choices

After the performance “I Did Not Leave Ukraine”, the discussion “Bordering on Darkness” will follow.
Friday, 12 December, MOS, after the show
Speakers: Ziemowit Szczerek, Antonina Palarczyk, Olha Menko.
Moderator: Michał Olszewski.
Topic: war, responsibility, the cost of freedom, and the individual’s drama in a borderline situation.

For the industry: a key debate on the profession of the theatre producer

Sunday, 7 December, 11 AM, Bunkier Sztuki
“Between Vision and Reality: Is the Producer the Missing Link in the Theatre Ecosystem?”
Moderation: Anna Galas-Kosil.
Introduction: Karolina Dziełak-Żakowska.
Guests: Karolina Ochab, Izabella Oleś, Ulrike Josephsson.
A discussion prepared by Theatre Institute specialists – authors of the latest report on this still undervalued, yet essential profession.

Post-show meetings with artists

For those with tickets, the festival offers a series of post-performance conversations led by theatre critics.
A chance to get close to the creators, ask about process, meanings and metaphors – and listen to dialogues that often complete the experience of the performance.