Bite the Dust

 

 

There is nothing heroic in Teatr Provisorium and Kampania Teatr’s bleak portrayal of war, based on Tadeusz Rozewicz’s WWII drama. The play kicks off with a strong image of four soldiers tied to wooden poles, as if to crosses, then falling over to the ground and swearing repeatedly.

Rather like Woyzeck, this production explores the wartime decay and death reflected in the gradual demoralisation of soldiers. The four men become prisoners of the grim, incomprehensible events acted out against a stylised apocalyptic wasteland set. It is all there in front of our eyes – poverty, humiliation and dehumanisation. Although the vision of war atrocities is extremely compelling, at times the actors hesitate to deliver their lines clearly and then it is hard to follow their words. Even so, the production does not fail to move us, opening the space which anyone would dread to enter.