'POLISH JOKE' Play will make audience think

By L. CROW
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
YOUNGSTOWN -- Blackbox Productions, Youngstown State University's student theater troupe, will stage "Polish Joke," a play that should resonate with Mahoning Valley residents.
Talk to director Joe Nahhas and cast member B.J. Wilkes for just a couple minutes, and you will find them bubbling with enthusiasm for the play. "Polish Joke," written by David Ives, is the story of a man of Jasiu Sadlowski, the son of Polish immigrants, who grew up in The Bush, a lower-class steel mill neighborhood in Chicago.
"He was told as a boy by his Uncle Roman that because he was Polish, he was cursed to be stupid, gloomy and miserable," said Nahhas.
"The problem is that Jasiu is extremely intelligent, capable, motivated. He reads 'Being and Nothingness' by Jean-Paul Sartre at age 9, when most kids are into SpongeBob. He accepts that he is capable of doing anything, but everything keeps going wrong for him. The play is a comedy, a parody on discrimination."
"The dramatic element of the play is Jasiu's struggle to find himself," adds Wilkes.
Good local match
Both students feel that this is a good play for the Youngstown area because it is such a melting pot of ethnic backgrounds, with people who are proud of their heritage. "The overall message of the play, the whole running theme, is pride," Nahhas adds. "It isn't necessarily about being Polish; it is about not being ashamed of who you are."
Throughout the play, Jasiu tries to escape what he thinks is "the Polish condition" by pretending to be of different ethnic backgrounds.
"His uncle has innocently warned him about the curse of being Polish, because all he has seen is failure and things going wrong," said Nahhas.
"Jasiu first enters a seminary to become a priest but leaves, disenchanted because he was unable to find the answer to this Polish riddle. He finally meets another Pole who explains to him that it is not the 'Polish condition' he is experiencing, but the 'human condition,' which everyone suffers through, no matter what their heritage."