Four people. Two stories. One price.

At one point, the lives of Eddie and Ani have changed beyond recognition. Maybe earlier the fate of their marriage was not idyllic, but at least they were both independent. Today, only one of them has this privilege...

John is a young and ambitious man who is continuously successful. In everyday life, however, he cannot cope with the simplest activities. That is why Jess, who needs some extra money, appears in his apartment...

The Pulitzer award-winning text “Cost of Living” by Martyna Majok is a story about piercing loneliness, the more acute because it is experienced in the presence of another person. Its first Polish performance was prepared at Teatr Śląski by Małgorzata Bogajewska, who, through her adaptation, asks what “disability” really means. Is it merely an another harmful label? Or maybe we all experience it ourselves, in a different aspect of everyday life, often without realising it? Are the characters of the story facing someone else’s or maybe their own disability? “Cost of Living” is an extremely intimate and touching story about strength, but also helplessness, love and loneliness – above all, however, about hope. 

As the author said during one interview: “I’ve always been excited that my play Cost of Living was produced in the theatre that staged Hunting Cockroaches by Janusz Głowacki in 1987 – exactly thirty years after Głowacki’s premiere. Ewa Zadrzyńska-Głowacka took part in Cost of Living, after seeing my earlier spectacle Ironbound. I love situations that combine the experience of the people and countries they come from. Especially when they connect strangers in a wonderful, unexpected way beyond the times in which they live. At the same time, I must add that there are many playwrights from many countries who are trying to understand what it is like to live between the homeland and the place of emigration; how it is when you leave your family and choose a new kind of life. They are even connected by the fact that they use theatre and black comedy to investigate these experiences. Now I am proud to be connected with the tradition of Polish playwrights.”

Majok’s pieces can be found in the repertoires of American theatres, but also the theatres of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and even Israel or Romania. Currently, after a long wait, they also hit Polish stages.

The co-producer of the premiere is Katowice Miasto Ogrodów – Instytucja Kultury im. Krystyny Bochenek. The premiere inaugurated the international “Open The Door” Festival in Katowice in 2019.