Why Witkacy? Yes I do honestly feel that I have spent half my life with Witkacy. I was first introduced to him by Leonidas Dudarew-Ossetynski in 1980, when as part of my theatre training (as a member of the Ossetynski Actors Lab) we began to work scenes from The Madman and the Nun as a class exercise. The weirdness of this play and the difficulty in playing it led me to read others of his plays. They are all weird - and required diligent and exasperating stretches of one's imagination. We worked on Madman for three years, then invited half a dozen academics to witness what would be our only performance. All of us involved felt that our little show approached the spirit of Witkacy, but did not quite fully capture it. I have been wrestling with his spectre ever since.

The OAL later produced Witkacy's Matka in a Los Angeles theatre (in 1983) to great success. It starred Polish theatre and film star Barbara Krafftowna in the title role. (I was required to teach her the role phonetically as she spoke not a word of English.) I have been teaching in the theatre myself for a dozen years, and I always reckoned I would tackle Witkacy again when I had the right group to work with. My theatre group Lazzi was formed in 1995 and Sandy Grierson was the first actor, formerly my student, to express similar interest. Sandy and I worked together on my play Mr Pinocchio and he shares a passion for Commedia Dell' Arte, street theatre and the Polish surrealist theatre.

We began working on The Madman and the Nun sporadically a couple of years ago as a training exercise. Curiously, some Polish friends of mine thought it a much better idea to do an original show about Witkacy, about his controversial life and legacy, 'in the Lazzi style', rather than simply produce one of the plays. The idea took root in me and Witkacy Idiota is the result. The 'idiota' is Russian and reflects Dostoyevsky's novel. We hope to capture the spirit of Witkacy in this world premiere, although he will forever remain elusive. And I hope the spirit of Mr Ossetynski will be amused. Am I doing justice to Witkacy? Truth is, I'm not trying to. I am playing with him, impishly and lovingly. Like him, I am something of a naughty clown.