Show about Polish WWII hero Jan Karski wins award in New York

A show about Polish World War II hero Jan Karski was among the winners as the New York-based Kosciuszko Foundation presented its annual Pioneer Awards to outstanding cultural figures earlier this month.

David Strathairn

PAP/Leszek Szymański

The cultural and educational foundation honoured the makers of Remember This: The Lesson of Jan Karski, a one-man show about the Polish wartime hero, who carried the first eyewitness accounts of the Holocaust to the world.

The show, directed by Derek Goldman, was staged earlier this year at the Theatre for a New Audience in New York.

The awards went to Goldman and Clark Young, who co-authored the production, and to Oscar-nominated actor David Strathairn, who portrayed Karski in the show.

In Theater for a New Audience’s “Remember This: The Lesson of Jan Karski,” our critic writes, David Strathairn gives a masterly performance that brings to anguished life Karski’s recollections of witnessing the horrors of the Holocaust. https://t.co/9q8wXBkGSq

— NYT Theater (@nytimestheater) September 16, 2022

The Kosciuszko Foundation also honoured Omar Sangare, a Polish-born actor who has developed a successful career in the United States as an actor, director, writer, producer, educator and philanthropist.

Sangare is the founder and artistic director of New York's United Solo Festival, the world's largest solo theatre festival.

Founded in 1925, the Kosciuszko Foundation aims to promote educational and cultural exchanges between the United States and Poland and to increase American understanding of Polish culture and history.

(mk/gs)