Szaflarska, Danuta

(1915-)

   Popular and esteemed actress, whose career in film and theater spans more than sixty years. Szaflar-ska graduated from an acting school in Warsaw in 1939. After the war, she appeared in the first Polish productions, such as Forbidden Songs (1947) and Treasure (1949), both directed by Leonard Buczkowski. During the Polish School period, she played in Kazimierz Kutz's People from the Train (1961), Stanisław Różewicz's Voice from Beyond (1962), and Stanisław Jędrykas The Impossible Goodbye (1962). In the 1970s and the 1980s, she played mostly in theater with a few exceptions, such as Tadeusz Konwicki's The Valley of Issa (1982). Szaflarska received the Best Supporting Actress award at the Festival of Polish Films for Dorota Kedzierzawska's Devils, Devils (1991) and Filip Zylber's Farewell to Marią (Pożegnanie z Marią, 1993). In recent years she has often played mothers of middle-aged protagonists, for example in A Week in the Life of a Man (1999, Jerzy Stuhr) and in the television film Yellow Scarf (2000, Janusz Morgenstern), and grandmothers, for example in Jerzy Wojcik's The Complaint (1991). Her other performances include roles in Faustyna (1994, Jerzy Łukaszewicz), The Executor (Egzekutor, 1999, Zylber), and The Queen of Clouds (2003, TV, Radosław Piwowarski).

   Historical Dictionary of Polish Cinema by Marek Haltof