Rehearsal for Truth 2021: The Madman and the Nun at Bohemian National Hall

Rehearsal for Truth Theater Festival present Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewiczs "The Madman and the Nun" - the iconic 1923 play that explores the tyranny of society over the individual as well as the boundaries of sanity. Sound familiar? The play can be seen as an absurdist comedy in which science, religion, and the state form a totalitarian alliance to bring about enforced happiness and social tranquility by means of psychiatric confinement. It is dedicated to all the madmen of the world.In "The Madman and the Nun," Walpurg, an acclaimed poet, is bound in a straitjacket in an insane asylum, his voice silenced by an even more insane bureaucracy of scientists and religious authorities. Whether Walpurg is a visionary or a hack is irrelevant, for in Witkiewicz's view, any artistic impulse "happens almost always on the very edge of madness." The asylum is run by lunatics. A nun is a creature of carnal passions. Murder is a cure for a murderer's madness. The Madman and the Nun is about an artist's struggle to maintain his sanity in an insane world. On several occasions, Walpurg attempts to reveal to the audience that society is a soulless machine. This is the universe in which Walpurg finds himself, a universe full of inexplicable uncertainties. The artist by definition is self-destructive on a cosmic scale. "The Madman and the Nun" (1923), Poland. Playwright: Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz. Direction and choreography: Daniel Irizarry. Cast: Nicole Betancourt (Dr. Jan Bidello), Ishani Das (Dr. Ephraim Grn), Michael Leonard (Alexander Walpurg), Axh Marie (Sister Barbara), Folami Williams (Sister Anna), Daniel Irizarry (Professor Walldorf). Set designer: Ozlem Gezgin. Set builder: Zilvinas Jonusas. Lighting design: Christina Tang. Music director: Desmar Guevara. Music: Troy Mobius Simms. Costume design: James Terrell. Produced by: Brooke Bell. Presented by: One-Eighth/Daniel Irizarry Theater, Polish Cultural Institute New York.