"Revealing a beautiful world beyond the destruction" The Independent

The tale of wartime survival that inspired an Oscar-winning film
Retold on stage in a poetic fusion of live music and words

Concert pianist Władysław Szpilman was playing Chopin live on Polish Radio, an air raid interrupted the broadcast.

The Nazi occupation of Warsaw reduced Szpilman to a café pianist in the Ghetto and took his family to concentration camps. The only thing that Szpilman managed to hold onto was the music in his head. The only piano he could play was the invisible keys on a tabletop.

Part concert, part play, The Pianist is based on Szpilman's memoir which is best known for Roman Polanski's Oscar-winning film. This stage version is conceived by pianist Mikhail Rudy who had also lived through a harrowing, persecuted existence. Seamlessly fusing music with words and featuring the memoirist's own writings and compositions as well as works by Chopin, Rudy is Szpilman the pianist and actor Peter Guinness plays Szpilman the fugitive.

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Performed by Mikhail Rudy and Peter Guinness
Direction and original concept by Mikhail Rudy