Hollywood Trains an Eye on Zbigniew Zamachowski

He may be one of Poland’s most famous faces, but so far, most of America hasn’t had the pleasure. In the next couple of weeks, though, 33-year-old actor Zbigniew Zamachowski will have two opportunities to catch Hollywood’s eye. Zamachowski stars in both Krzysztof Kieslowski’s “The Decalogue, Part 10,” showing with Part Nine next Sunday at the AFI Festival, and Kieslowski’s “White,” which opened this month.

In a recent visit to Hollywood, the actor, who boasts immense soulful green eyes, sat next to his female interpreter in his hotel suite displaying supremely perfect posture and a bemused perspective on his new foreign environment.

“The room is extremely sophisticated in its technology,” he says, pushing the computerized buttons on the clock that offer him a decadent array of options. “Perhaps too sophisticated.”

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Although both “The Decalogue” and “White” are visions of the same director, Zamachowski was given the challenge of playing two diverse roles. In “The Decalogue,” he portrays a young rock star who, along with his older brother, becomes obsessed with a valuable stamp collection. In “White”--the second of Kieslowski’s trilogy “Three Colors,” based on the French motto “Liberty, Equality and Fraternity” and the colors of the French flag--he faces the Angst and vicissitudes of love as the husband of a wayward wife, portrayed by French actress Julie Delpy.

In “The Decalogue,” the actor sings and plays guitar, two talents that helped him originally get discovered in 1980. After seeing Zamachowski perform at a national music festival, Polish director Krzysztof Rogulski cast him as the lead in the film “The Great Picnic Party.” Presumably, the title loses something in translation, because it was a huge hit in Poland (it was never released in the United States). “It was horrendously popular,” Zamachowski says with a deep chuckle.

That success prompted him to abandon his studies in economics and music and enroll in the famous Lodz Film School, from which he graduated in 1985.

Since that time, the actor has worked in more than 30 films. His latest performance, in “White,” is perhaps his best, partly because, he says, the character is so meaty. “Karol is more multidimensional, fuller, more human than Arthur (his character in “The Decalogue”).”

On working with the notoriously taciturn Kieslowski, Zamachowski says: “The work with Krzysztof was very specific. He was very cautious in his remarks. He leaves the acting not just to the actor but also to the camera operator. He allowed me a certain space of freedom.

“Allow me to tell you what it is like working with Krzysztof. A year before starting the filming (of “White”), he told me that he was going to make this movie with me and that he wrote the scenario with me in mind. I subsequently read with him one day before shooting was to start in Paris.

“We spoke for about half an hour. He told me that I should keep in mind the films of Charlie Chaplin. That doesn’t mean that I should imitate him, which clearly would have been impossible. But I kept in mind the aura that surrounds his films. He told me to keep in mind a certain state of balance between what is tragic in this movie and what is comical. I didn’t need any more words than that.”

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Zamachowski was raised in a small town in central Poland by a truck driver father and clerk mother. “My family on both sides is quite numerous so we had lots of children,” he says. “Lots of gardens and trees. The further I advance in my life, the more I feel like this was a period of paradise.”

For the past nine years, Zamachowski has resided in Warsaw, where he is currently starting his own nuclear family, with his second wife, actress Aleksandra Justa, who is four months pregnant with their first child.

Next fall, the actor begins shooting “Torsje,” with director Juliusz Machulski. But for now, Zamachowski’s thoughts are on Hollywood; this is, in fact, his second visit here.

“The first one was a year ago--I was just a tourist,” he says. “The first thing I did was to tour Universal Studios. I think this was an incredible adventure,” he says, his eyes aglow. “When I went on the Earthquake ride, for those few minutes, I was a child again.”