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Comments on the play “Polish Joke”
I had some concerns before I went to see this play but still decided to
see it with my Polish wife. Years before I met my wife I had a Polish
professor in graduate school and was sensitized to Polish and other
ethnic jokes.
The first act was filled with jokes and remarks about the stereotypical
image of Poles in America, low class and not smart. Although the program
said that you could put any ethnicity in the names for the jokes, the
playwright chose Poles, why? The program and the play itself did not
answer this question. The second act attempts to correct this negative
image.
The play represents a trip through life for a young Pole in America who
is filled with all the negative images of Poles by his “all knowing and
wise” uncle. As a result he goes through life trying to escape being
Polish, without success. This act resulted in a lot of laughs from the
audience, probably mostly from non-Poles.
As a last resort he tries to move to Ireland but this trip is thwarted
when his airplane is re-routed to Poland where he meets a wise and high
thinking Polish woman whom he marries. She tells him of her love for
Poland and the Polish people, of the Poles who fought in the American
Revolutionary war to help us to free ourselves from England, of the 3
million non-Jewish Poles who died in the Nazi death camps during the
Second World War. This last issue is not often mentioned, or known, in
non-Polish circles.
Overall, the second act at least partly mitigated the negative image of
Poles given in the first act. It even poked fun at the Irish.
The performers acted well and even played several parts each. I imagine
that you will find a variety of emotions about this play in both Polish
and non-Polish groups. I hope that some of the non-Poles in the audience
learned something from the second act.
Douglas McNeilly
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