Premiere: May 20^th, 2022 Kunstenfestivaldesarts

This production was made in a country where women have limited access to reproductive health, and where abortion is now illegal. Despite immense protests, women were simply denied their rights. The project started with the idea that women could come together and, without shame or fear, publicly manifest that they have had an abortion, and that this collective act would change the law.

It could be an activist success story.

But She was a friend of someone else is a story with too many beginnings, too few endings – and an exhausted narrator.

In this creation, Gosia Wdowik explores the link between burnout and activism: the fear that rights are not acquired forever, and that the moment one lowers the attention, they risk disappearing. Through a personal narrative, she describes the commitment to women's rights in Poland. Through subtle choreography, we are drawn into the life of a woman who decides one day, instead of protesting, to stay in bed, only to eventually come out again.

concept, text and direction Gosia Wdowik

collaboration in dramaturgy Maria Rössler

visuals and creative technology Jimmy Grimma

set design Dominika Olszowy, Tomasz Mróz

light design Aleksandr Prowaliński

performed by Jaśmina Polak, Oneka von Schrader, Gosia Wdowik

Work with/by

Agnieszka, Dominika, Jaśmina, Ania, Urszula, Marta K., Justyna, Natalia, Julia, Martyna, Ola, Małga, Krystyna, Marta, Zosia, Edka, Doris, Yulia, Agata, Kinga, Beata, Iza, Zuza, Ewa, Magda.

Special thanks to

Jan Tomza-Osiecki, Marta Jalowska, Dorota Glac, Kamila Worobiej, Martyna Wawrzyniak, Marta Nawrot, Keerthi Basavarajaiah, Justin Schembri  

Production: NOWY TEATR Warsaw, CAMPO Gent

Coproduction: KUNSTENFESTIVALDESARTS, Teatro Municipal do Porto, SPRING Festival Utrecht, Frascati Producties, HELLERAU - Europäisches Zentrum der Künste, Spielart Festival Munich, Dublin Theatre Festival, Beursschouwburg

photo by Thomas Lenden