By Yu Bai
Silence is rarely still. It shifts and seethes, a breathing thing, laying bare the hidden hum of existence. In All That I Left Behind Is Here, Romuald Krężel begins not with spectacle but with silence, so dense, weighty, and so complete that it pulls the audience into dialogue with their own presence. In this quiet, even the scratch of my pen feels seismic, as though the theater itself were leaning in, eavesdropping.
From the silence, it emerges a world of possibilities. The solo performance occupies space in a way that feels both deliberate and organic, like ivy curling across a wall, or perhaps like someone who has lived long enough to know that taking one’s time is, in fact, an art form. The stage is sparsely arranged: a black pair of heeled shoes, a smoke machine, a guitar and amplifier, a microphone, and a drum set. Each object hums with potential energy, their mundane forms transformed into mysterious talismans under the pale lights. The stillness of the opening moments made the smallest twitch of a finger feel like the movement of tectonic plates. And when Krężel finally moves, it’s like watching a pebble drop into a still pond, the ripples spreading quietly but persistently.
This is not a performance that offers itself up neatly, wrapped in narrative bows. It unfolds like a dream, one of those where the logic bends, doubles back, and you occasionally find yourself wondering, “Did I leave the kettle on?” Smoke rises from the stage, catching the light and creating a screen-like veil between us and Krężel, between the now and the then. The room begins to glow faintly, and suddenly we’re no longer here. “I’m Romuald,” he says, his voice calm but with a quiet pull. “I’m 10 years old.” These words, spoken plainly, feel like an open door. We step through.
And what a world awaits. The ballroom comes alive, suffused with a nostalgic purple light as music swells. For a fleeting moment, it’s romantic, until we realize that this isn’t about romance. It’s about resilience. The ballroom becomes a symbol: of aspiration, of what a working-class Polish child might dream of reaching for, and of what society might deny. Krężel’s movements are deliberate but charged with an emotional undercurrent, his body carrying the weight of a story that is both deeply personal and broadly universal. The music, a blend of post-punk grit and the sweeping melodies of traditional ballroom, feels like the heartbeat of this memory, a rhythm equal parts yearning and resolve.
Yet Krężel doesn’t let us sink too far into nostalgia. The piece opens with a dedication: “To saleswomen in supermarkets, not just in Berlin.” From the outset, we’re reminded that this isn’t a performance meant to stay within the safe confines of sentimentality. This is theater as excavation, as interrogation. Through fragmented and nonlinear stories, Krężel explores the unspoken classism that colors everyday life, asking difficult questions but doing so with a wit and lightness that feels disarming rather than accusatory.
The stage becomes a kind of map, not of geography but of emotion. When Krężel dons the black heeled shoes, their sharp staccato tapping slices through the smoke-heavy air. The gesture feels absurd at first (heels in a fog bank?), but soon its poignancy emerges, and laughter gives way to reflection. Later, he strums the guitar with childlike abandon or drums with a beat that teeters on the edge of chaos. These moments vibrate with a raw, unpolished energy, capturing the fleeting, infinite quality of memory: moments that slip through your fingers even as you hold onto them.
Halfway through the performance, Krężel stops. The light shifts, stripping the dreamlike haze and exposing everything with an unflinching clarity. He stands still, looking directly at the audience. He doesn’t say it, but his gaze asks the question anyway: What is theater for? In this moment, the piece cracks wide open. It’s no longer just about memory or class. It’s about who gets to speak, who gets to take the stage, and who gets to decide what stories are worth telling. The answers don’t come neatly packaged. They hover, unresolved, like smoke that never quite clears. And that’s the point. All That I Left Behind Is Here isn’t interested in tidy endings. It’s interested in openings: a door, a wound, a conversation. Its questions linger, refusing to settle, as though daring you to forget them.
Krężel’s work, above all, is an act of generosity. He offers us his story, told with humor, vulnerability, and a subtle wink here and there that keeps the weight from becoming too much to bear. It asks much of its audience but gives even more in return. In its quiet, in its stillness, in its dreamlike meander through time, All That I Left Behind Is Here becomes more than a performance, it becomes a memory we share, a reminder that theater is at its best not when it reflects us back at ourselves but when it shows us something we’ve never seen before.
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