Figura, Katarzyna

(1962-)

   Popular actress, voted the best Polish actress in 1987 and 1997 by Film readers. Although Figura has appeared in several films since 1976, her breakthrough was Radosław Piwowarski's Train to Hollywood (1987), where she played a small-town bartender, Mariola "Merlin" Wafelek, dreaming of Hollywood fame. After this and several later films, such as Marek Koterski's Porno (1989), she started to function as a Polish sex symbol. In the mid-1990s, she began to reveal her comic sensibility and to parody her earlier roles and her own screen persona. Films such as Jerzy Stuhr's Love Stories (1997), Janusz Zaorski's Happy New York (1997), and particularly Juliusz Machulski's crime comedies Kiler (1997) and its sequel, Kiler 2 (1999), bolstered her popularity. She also appeared in personal films directed by Andrzej Kondratiuk—The Spinning Wheel of Time (1995) and The Sundial (1997). For her role in Koterski's I Love You (1999), she received the Best Actress award at the Festival of Polish Films.

   Figura's career has flourished in recent years. She appeared in Piotr Weresniak's In Love (Zakochani, 2000) and Station (Stacja, 2001). She also played in prestigious productions such as Andrzej Wajda's Revenge (2002) and surprised her followers with a leading role as an unattractive small-town woman in a modest television film directed by Ryszard Brylski, White Sup (Żurek, 2004), for which she received the Polish Film Award "Eagle." In addition, she received another acting award at the Festival of Polish Films for her role in Piotr Szulkin's political satire Ubu (2003).

   Historical Dictionary of Polish Cinema by Marek Haltof