Andrzej Seweryn

Andrzej Seweryn was born in 1946 in Heilbronn, Germany. He is one of the most successful Polish actors and directors in the world. He has had prominent parts in many of the films of Andrzej Wajda, including The Promised Land and Man of Iron. In 1980, he was awarded the Silver Bear Prize at the Berlin Film Festival for the best actor for his performance in The Conductor. Because he sympathized with the goals of the Polish Solidarity movement, he left Poland in 1981, fearing some form of reprisal by the government. He played a prominent part in the legendary performance of Peter Brook’s The Mahabharata, and he became a permanent member of the Comédie-Français, only the third member in the history of the Comédie-Français who was not a native speaker of French. He played parts in the Oscar Prize-winning films Indochina and Schindler’s List. His most recent film, The Last Family, won prizes at several film festivals. Since 2011, he has served as the director of the Polish Theatre (Teatr Polski) in Warsaw, where he also performs as an actor in some of the productions.