Andrzej Seweryn

Andrzej Teodor Seweryn (Polish pronunciation: ; born 25 April 1946) is a Polish actor and director. One of the most successful Polish theatre actors, he starred in over 50 films, mostly in Poland, France, and Germany. He is also one of only three non-French actors to have been hired by the Paris-based Comédie-Française. He is currently serving as director general of the Polski Theatre in Warsaw. In 1990, he was ranked among the three greatest Polish dramatic actors after 1965 alongside Piotr Fronczewski and Wojciech Pszoniak. Life and career Andrzej Seweryn was born on 25 April 1946 in Heilbronn, Germany. His parents, Zdzisław and Zofia, were captured and forced into slave labor in Germany during World War II. After the birth of Andrzej, they returned to Poland. He was raised in Warsaw where he attended the Joachim Lelewel High School No. 41. In 1968 he graduated from the National Academy of Dramatic Art in Warsaw and worked at Teatr Ateneum where he continued to act until 1980. He was one of the co-organizers of the 1968 student protest at the University of Warsaw in response to the banning of Dziady (Forefathers' Eve) directed by Kazimierz Dejmek by the Polish communist authorities. In the same year, he spent five months in prison for distributing leaflets against the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia. Already in the 1970s he gained much fame following his appearance in numerous films directed by Andrzej Wajda, notably Without Anesthesia, The Promised Land and the Man of Iron. For his role in Wajda's 1980 Dyrygent Seweryn received the Silver Bear for Best Actor at the 30th Berlin International Film Festival. In 1980 Seweryn also made his stage debut in France following the staging of Wajda's interpretation of plays by Stanisław Witkiewicz at the Théâtre Nanterre-Amandiers.