Opening Night: 19 November 2015 
Author: Juliusz Słowacki
Title: Kordian
Original Title: Kordian
Director: Jan Englert

Auditorium: Boguslawski Hall 
Running time: 1 hour 55 min, no interval 



Kordian

The Polish nation's tragic choice: to die heroically in the name of a noble idea or live a life "making shoes for dogs"? — the alternative presented to Kordian in two parables.

The play contains excerpts from Johann Wolfgang Goethe's Faust (trans. Adam Pomorski), Juliusz Słowacki's Kordian (trans. into English by Gerard T. Kapolka), fragments of the script of Stanisław Wyspiański's "Hamlet" directed by Jerzy Grzegorzewski and Wyspiański's drama Liberation, as well as the fragments of Słowacki's poem The Testament of Mine and his drama Samuel Zborowski.

Premiere on 19 November 2015 on 250th Anniversary of the National Theatre

author of the script and director: Jan Englert
set design: Barbara Hanicka
music: Stanisław Radwan
choreography: Tomasz Wygoda
lighting design: Jacqueline Sobiszewski
engineering design: [Mirosław Łysik]
video films director: Marek Kozakiewicz
animations: Michał Jankowski
stunt & special effects: Andrzej Słomiński

Cast

  • Archangel Danuta Stenka
    Satan Mariusz Bonaszewski (as a guest actor from September 1, 2019)
    Mephistopheles Mateusz Rusin 
    Old Kordian Jerzy Radziwiłowicz
    Kordian I Marcin Hycnar (as a guest actor from September 1, 2016)
  • Kordian II Kamil Mrożek / Paweł Brzeszcz (understudy from November 6, 2024)
    Laura I Ewa Wiśniewska
    Laura II Anna Grycewicz
    Grand Duke Grzegorz Małecki
    Tsar Oskar Hamerski
    Mother Ewa Konstancja Bułhak / Anna Lobedan
    Father Grzegorz Kwiecień
    Death Anna Gryszkówna
    Devil Beata Fudalej
    Angel Magdalena Warzecha
    Violetta Monika Dryl, Joanna Gryga, Dominika Kluźniak, Paulina Szostak, Paulina Korthals, Patrycja Soliman, Michalina Łabacz 

And the actors of the National Theatre as Angels, Devils, Witches, Cardinals, Speakers, Soldiers, Poles

Marek Barbasiewicz, Bartłomiej Bobrowski, Ewa Konstancja Bułhak, Sebastian Dela, Monika Dryl, Beata Fudalej, Jakub Gawlik, Wiktoria Gorodeckaja, Piotr Grabowski, Anna Grycewicz, Joanna Gryga, Anna Gryszkówna, Arkadiusz Janiczek, Robert Jarociński, Aleksandra Justa, Dominika Kluźniak, Mateusz Kmiecik, Mirosław Konarowski, Paulina Korthals, Justyna Kowalska, Waldemar Kownacki, Piotr Kramer, Joanna Kwiatkowska-Zduń, Grzegorz Kwiecień, Anna Lobedan, Michalina Łabacz, Hubert Łapacz, Sławomira Łozińska, Kacper Matula, Jacek Mikołajczak, Paweł Paprocki, Hubert Paszkiewicz, Piotr Piksa, Karol Pocheć, Marcin Przybylski, Henryk Simon, Adam Szczyszczaj, Paulina Szostak, Beata Ścibakówna, Paweł Tołwiński, Magdalena Warzecha

Guest actors

Karol Dziuba (as a guest actor from March 1, 2025), Maciej Hanczewski, Kamil Maria Małanicz, Damian Mirga, Wiesława Niemyska, Szymon Nowak, Mariusz Urbaniec, Bartosz Wesołowski

 

And children

Felicja Nizińska, Tymoteusz Czajka, Jerzy Kozłowski, Franciszek Krupowicz, Michał Pietruczuk


Audio recording: Orchestra under direction of [Mirosław Jastrzębski]


Production team

  • director's assistant: Anna Turowiec
  • assistant director trainee: Anna Gryszkówna (AT)
  • sound technician: Mariusz Maszewski
  • lighting technicians: Zbigniew Szulim, Bartłomiej Kaczalski
    video projection: Mariusz Chałubek, Paweł Woźniak
  • stage manager: Krzysztof Kuszczyk
  • prompter: Anna Leszczyńska


Gallery

  • ←
  • →

Danuta Stenka (Archangel), Mariusz Bonaszewski (Satan). Phot. Yato Photography

  • THE POLISH THERMOPYLAE

    In his first play at the National Theatre, director Jan Klata has opted for Tadeusz Miciński's The Polish Thermopylae. Opening Night: 22 November 2025

  • INFINITY JEST

    Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace directed by Kamil Białaszek | Opening Night: 13 December 2025 

  • CHARLATANS

    “When I’m not acting, life is black and white,” says the heroine of Pablo Remón’s play. Charlatans directed by Grzegorz Małecki, Polish preview: 13 June 2025.

  • HAMLET

    Jan Englert crowns his twenty-eight seasons of artistic work at the National Theatre with a performance of Hamlet.

  • HEAVEN AND HELL

    Although Maria Wojtyszko's play touches upon the painful subject of losing loved ones, Jakub Krofta's deft staging provides light entertainment for the whole family. 

  • OTHER DELIGHTS

    This adaptation of the novel Other Delights is the second staging of one of Jerzy Pilch's works at the National Theatre, following The Holy Father's Skis.  

  • FAUST

    Faust is a story based on an ancient legend of a scholar who yearns so much for just a moment of happiness that he makes a pact with the devil. 

  • A DREAM PLAY

    After the well-received Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Sławomir Narloch returned to the National Theatre with another premiere – A Dream Play by Strindberg.

     

  • KING LEAR

    King Lear may be Shakespeare's boldest examination of human nature. Jan Englert will play the title role in the National Theatre's production.

  • WAITING FOR GODOT

    "What do we do now? Wait. [...] We're waiting for Godot". Piotr Cieplak directs Waiting for Godot by Beckett. Is this a classic yet? Does it still have its avant-garde power?

  • FREDRO: THE JUBILEE YEAR

    To celebrate 230 years since Aleksander Fredro's birth, the National Theatre invites you to an evening dedicated to the life and works of Poland’s greatest comedy writer. 

  • TALES FROM THE VIENNA WOODS

    Małgorzata Bogajewska directs for the second time at the National Theatre. This time she draws on Ödön von Horváth's 1931 drama.

  • THE THEATRE MAKER

    The play by Thomas Bernhard, one of the most outstanding playwrights of the second half of the 20th century. In the title role – Jerzy Radziwiłowicz. 

  • ALICE'S WONDERLAND

    Have you ever quarreled with the Time or visited a forest where things have no names? Alice’s Wonderland is a musical performance based on the famous novel by Lewis Carroll. 

  • THE MISANTHROPE

    Jan Englert stages a classic play by Molière. What is Alcest's misanthropy: an uncompromising commitment to the truth or a doomed uprising against social conventions?

  • THE DECALOGUE

    A meditation upon the moral foundations of the present – an iconic work of Polish cinema, rethought thirty-five years after its creation by Krzysztof Kieślowski and Krzysztof Piesiewicz. 

  • MARY STUART

    Grzegorz Wiśniewski returns to the classic drama about human passions interwoven in a ruthless machinery of history and intrigue.

  • MÜNCHHAUSEN FOR ADULTS

    Baron von Münchhausen lived in the 18th century and told incredible stories about himself. Maciej Wojtyszko directs his own play about the famous adventurer and mystifier.

  • Solidarity with Ukraine | Солідарні з Україною

    The ensemble of the National Theatre stands in solidarity with the Ukrainians who are fighting for the independence of their homeland.

  • PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK

    1900. On a hot, stormy day, Mrs Appleyard's boarding school residents go on a picnic near Hanging Rock. The new theatrical version of the Australian prose classics. 

  • SNAKE SKIN

    Artur Urbański directs his own play which main character is Ruth Berlau, one of Bertolt Brecht's closest associates and life companions.

  • AUTUMN SONATA

    A story about the need for love and acceptance, about an inherited emotional coldness, about the psychological costs of creativity. A theatrical version of a film script by Ingmar Bergman. 

  • MOTHER JOAN OF THE ANGELS

    A performance about the need to experience something that surpasses us. In the title role of the prioress – Małgorzata Kożuchowska. 

  • HOW TO BE LOVED

    This is the performance about love and moral responsibility for another person as well as the mechanisms controlling human memory. The dramatisation of the story by Kazimierz Brandys.


  • LUNGS

    Briliant, full of humour and touching love story of a young couple. Breakups and comebacks, passion and sex, the first important decisions and the search for meaning in a complex, modern world.


  • UHLANS

    The Museum of All-Time Polish Uhlans. Exhibits of the national exacerbation. A serious comedy in three acts about the entanglement in myths of Polishness. 


  • THE IMAGE MAKERS

    The truth about the essence of creation and responsibility in art. Director Viktor Sjöström is working on the film The Phantom Carriage, based on the novel by Nobel Prize winner Selma Lagerlöf. 

  • FOREFATHER'S EVE

    Mickiewicz's poetic drama interpreted by Lithuanian Master Eimuntas Nekrošius — theatre visionary known for his unique theatrical language.


  • KORDIAN

    The Polish nation's tragic choice: to die heroically in the name of a noble idea or live a life "making shoes for dogs"? — the alternative presented to Kordian in two parables.

  • FLEA THE SWINDLER

    Tremendous fun and great laughs – not just for kids. The antics of the Flea are directed by Anna Seniuk with the music composed by Maciej Małecki.


By continuing to use this site, you consent to our use of cookies. You can adjust cookies settings via your internet browser. Review our cookies policy here.

You can adjust your cookies settings below:

  Allow storing advertising data.

  Allow storing user data.

  Allow personalized ads.

  Allow storing analytical data.