Director – Uršulė Bartoševičiūtė

Costume Designer – Dainius Bendikas

Choreographer – Oksana Griaznova

Video Artist – Martynas Norvaišas

Set Designer – Rūta Venskutė

Composer – Rita Mačiliūnaitė

Lighting Designer – Julius Kuršys

Stage Manager – Gelena Ivaškevič

Play translation (Hungarian to Polish) – Jolanta Jarmołowicz

Production Manager – Aleksandra Šalkinė

Performance consultant – Karina Gžibovskaja

Director Uršulė Bartoševičiūtė’s adaptation of Kata Wéber’s play Pieces of a Woman (Polish: Cząstki kobiety) tells the gripping story of a young couple expecting their first child – a contemporary family drama built on the resilience and determination of its female characters. As the family navigates personal tragedy, their intimate struggles illuminate broader societal issues and inner conflicts of modern life.

At 30, Maja confronts a devastating personal loss. Forced to reconsider her previous life, the protagonist attempts to rebuild her relationships from scratch. Pieces of a Woman compellingly portrays the experience of a modern woman fighting for autonomy over her body and everyday existence.

The tragic events force Maja to piece herself back together. An illusion of a harmonious family starts to shatter, unearthing old wounds and tensions. The tragedy pries open Pandora’s box – and out come addiction, money woes, inheritance disputes, a mother’s descent into dementia.

The play explores the complexities of multilingual family dynamics, highlighting cultural stereotypes and misunderstandings rooted in differing identities and traditions. The divide between secular freedom and religious conservatism further accentuates the fault lines. A borderline obsessive urge arises within the family to assign blame and punish someone in pursuit of an illusory ‘justice’ and ‘absolution’.

Wéber paints each character with meticulous care and empathy, refraining from judgment while sensitively portraying their transformations. Employing cinematic techniques and intimate storytelling, the production’s raw authenticity captivates audiences.

“Above all, Pieces of a Woman speaks about a woman’s right to her body and autonomy. When I look at Maja, I see every woman who has faced loss, grief, suffering, and doubt, striving to reclaim emotional and physical balance. Maja’s family circles around her like vultures, waiting for a misstep. There’s a tangible chain of suffering – unloving and competitive dynamics born in one generation multiply and pass onto the next.” (Uršulė Bartoševičiūtė)

Pieces of a Woman is the first professional Polish-language production at a state theatre in Lithuania since the interwar period.

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Kata Wéber is a Hungarian playwright and screenwriter, a graduate of the University of Theatre and Film Arts in Budapest. She is known for plays such as Dementia, Imitation of Life, The Seven Deadly Sins/Motherland (after Bertolt Brecht), and the libretto for the opera Journey of Hope. She wrote Pieces of a Woman in 2018 in collaboration with Hungarian director Kornél Mundruczó. Premiered at TR Warszawa in Poland, the production gained international acclaim. The play has later been staged at some of the world’s most prestigious venues, appearing at major festivals – including Avignon Festival, Athens & Epidaurus Festival, the Divine Comedy Festival, and the Sirenos Festival. In 2019, it received the Grand Prix for Best Performance at the Divine Comedy Festival in Kraków. In 2020, Wéber’s play was adapted into the Netflix drama Pieces of a Woman, starring Vanessa Kirby.

Uršulė Bartoševičiūtė (Barto) is among the most compelling theatre directors of Lithuania’s younger generation, recognised both domestically and internationally. Awarded Lithuania’s Young Artist Prize in 2021, her production of Macbeth (2023) earned five nominations at the Icelandic Theatre Awards. Her recent work, Anatomy of a Suicide (Lithuanian National Drama Theatre, 2024), was nominated for the prestigious Golden Stage Cross awards in multiple categories – including Best Director, Best Supporting Actress, and Best Set Design.

In her art, Bartoševičiūtė frequently investigates time, intergenerational dynamics, and evolving traumas, continually seeking to challenge traditional narratives. She is particularly interested in how certain experiences and sentiments transform over time: how we historically represent women on stage; how classical texts can be more meaningfully adapted; what dynamics we prefer to witness both on stage and in rehearsal rooms. Ultimately, she ponders how time shapes us – apart from driving us towards physical decline and ideological datedness.

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MAJA: [...] It’s my body. It’s deeply personal. Do you understand? It’s not something you can beautify – like a neighbourhood or a landscape. It’s none of your business. I don’t want to discuss it. Especially not here, in front of everyone.

LARS: Are you familiar with the story of the Tacoma Bridge? In the forties, it collapsed spontaneously. For some time, nobody understood why. Later, it transpired that resonance could have caused the tragedy. Every object has its own vibrations. If external excitation matches the object’s frequency, resonance occurs. [...] Even a bridge can collapse.

                      (From Kata Wéber’s play Pieces of a Woman)

Contains nudity, intense lighting effects (strobe lights), obscene language and loud music. The performance depicts childbirth and the death of a newborn. Emotional and psychological support: https://pagalbasau.lt/ 

Performed in Polish with Lithuanian subtitles. If you want to see the captions clearly, we recommend choosing seats in the stalls from the 7th row.

Cast:

Maja Nitowska – Gabrielė Andruškevič
Lars Alsvag – Oskar Wyganowski
Magdalena Złocka – Jelena Bogdanovič / Anžela Bizunovič
Monika Nitowska – Justina Stankevič
Wojtek Krys – Artur Svorobovič / Maksim Tuchvatulin
Zuzanna Złocka – Jevgenija Gladij
Ewa Janina – Aleksandra Metalnikova

Rehearsal of the performance. Photo by Telman Ragimov.