– How quiet it is here.

– If you don’t want to hear, it might seem quiet. When the scream rings out, nothing will ever be the same again.

– A scream? Over the kingdom?

– Evil eyes are staring at the kingdom.*

Mrs Drusse (Elżbieta Karkoszka) is pacing the hospital corridors in search of the ghost of a wronged girl with whom she made contact in an elevator. Along with her, and a team of Denmark’s finest doctors, including the belligerent head, Helmer (Radosław Krzyżowski), we shall delve into the real space of the Kingdom – the Stary Theatre – full of passageways and corridors known only to initiates. The multimedia projections make the stage expand, consuming the entire building and revealing its secrets to the audience. In The Kingdom the actors perform not only on stage – the eye of the camera also invades their private space, providing a look into what goes on where the public is forbidden.

“It is a marvelous thing to have a place to work that is so gigantic that it cannot be fathomed, and where odd things transpire,” von Trier said. In the theatre version of the Kingdom series, directed by Remigiusz Brzyk, this place is the Stary Theatre building, and the symbolic space is its long history, forged by the work of the many generations of artists who have built its renown.

Above all, “The Kingdom” is, to my mind, another chapter in the restored ensemble of the Stary Theatre. It is an orchestra, one with displays of solo artistry, but an orchestra nonetheless. They remain a community, and they perform beautifully.

Łukasz Maciejewski, Onet Kultura

* fragments from the script of the Riget/Kingdom series by Lars von Trier and Niels Vørsel

Copyrights for the AUTHORS of the work are represented by ADiT Agency, Elżbieta Manthey.