Theatre and film actor, born 14 March 1942 in Leńcze, a village near Kraków and died 15 May 2022. He’s known for his outstanding performances in ‘Forefather’s Eve’ and ‘Wyzwolenie’ (Liberation), amongst others.
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He was supposed to follow in the footsteps of his father and work as a railwayman, but Trela ended up in Kraków’s Liceum Plastyczne (Arts High School). He then went on to work as a scenic designer and puppet operator at the Lalkowy Theatre, located near Nowa Huta’s Ludowy Theatre. Zofia and Władysław Jaremów invited Trela to come work with them at the Lalki i Maski ‘Groteska’ Theatre. Influenced by Zofia Jaremów as well as his friends at the ‘Groteska’, he passed the entrance exam to the National Academy of Theatre Arts in Kraków.
During his studies, he began working with the recently formed STU Theatre. Whilst there, he played Popryszczyn in Mikołaj Gogol’s Pamiętnik Wariata (Diary of a Madman). The play received first place at the international theatre festival in West Germany’s Erlangen in 1966. After completing his studies in 1969, he began working with the Rozmaitość Theatre (now known as Bagatela Theatre) in Kraków, where he played Płaton Kowalew in an adaptation of Mikołaj Gogol’s Nos (1969, dir. Jan Łukowski) and Gołubkow in Mikhail Bulgakov’s Flight (1969, dir. Halina Gryglaszewska), amongst other roles.
From 1970 onwards, he worked with the Stary Theatre in Kraków. Here, thanks to collaborations with creators from different disciplines, Jerzy Trela’s talent flourished and matured. In plays by Jerzy Jarocki, Konrad Swinarski, Andrzej Wajda, Kazimierz Kutz and Kristian Lupa he played a multitude of roles: from bit parts to protagonists, these roles belong to the rank of the greatest Polish performances. Jerzy Jarocki first classed him as a character actor, capable of great transformations. Trela therefore played Czeladnik in The Shoemakers (1971) as well as the deceitful Agent Murdel-Bęski in The Mother (1972) – two famous stagings of Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz’s plays.
Right after this, he went on to play larger roles in Konrad Swinarski’s renditions of Forefathers’ Eve (originally: Dziady, 1973) and Wyzwolenie (Liberation, 1974). Both performances indubitably deserve to be called outstanding creations. Jerzy Trela’s personality ideally matched this directorial interpretation of Forefather’s Eve, as it created a universal drama, focused on rebellion against bondage in any form.
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Jerzy Trela’s Konrad appears to say: I rebel, therefore I am. This is not a historic rebellion as defined by existentialists, a rebellion to regain societal freedom, but rather a metaphysical rebellion. A challenge sent up to God, who allowed evil in his world, who conemned mankind to suffering and death.
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Bronisław Mamoń, 'Dziady' in 'Tygodnik Powszechny', 4 March 1973, nr 9
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This role was a powerful challenge, because I knew that I could not do what Gustaw Holoubek under Kazimierz Dejmka’s direction did in that memorable version of ‘Forefathers’ Eve’ in 1968. But Swinarski wanted a different protagonist. A normal person. His Konrad stepped down from his pedestal, entered the scene from the street. This was not meant to be a struggle with internal enslavement, but with an external version as well, a fight with oneself.
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'Artystą zostaje się później' interview with Beata Matkowska-Święs, 'Gazeta Wyborcza' 9 February 2001, nr 34
According to Krystyna Zbijewska, writing in Dziennik Polski, Trela’s Konrad from Wyspiański’s Wyzwolenie (1974) was ‘an incarnation of Poland’s soul, a Konrad desperate for action, dreaming of freeing his country, his nation, his art...‘.
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Jerzy Trela’s role is an impassioned denial of theatre as a looking-glass for literature. Its intellectual and physical effort, the actor’s grappling with the material resistance of the drama’s thoughts and words... How must one live, in what temperature, to lift such as a challenge?
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Elżbieta Morawiec, 'Konrad i Muza' in 'Teatr' 16-30 September 1974, nr 18
In Stanisław Wyspiański’s Warszawianka, directed by Henryk Tomaszewski (1976), he engagingly played the role of Old Wiarus, a role with a long history and tradition attached to it. He continued his collaboration with Jerzy Jarocki in further plays: Nikolai Gogol’s The Government Inspector (1980), Thomas S. Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral (1982) and Pedro Calderón de la Barca’s Life is a Dream (1983). In Sławomir Mrożek’s Portrait (1988), he played Anatol.
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Jerzy Trela has so perfectly differentiated his role, that he really plays two characters: Anatold Bartodziej and the real Anatol, a man of flesh and blood. The first of the two he built out of the grotesque. For the second, he smothered the brief comic elements with drama.
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Andrzej Wanat, "Portret 'Portretu' ", "Teatr" 1996, nr 9
Other excellent roles, created with laser precision, were the Father in Gombrowicz’s The Marriage (1991) and Mephistopheles in Johann Wolfgang Goethe’s Faust (1997). He worked with Andrzej Wajda in Z Biegiem Lat, Z Biegiem Dni... (The Passing of Years, the Passing of Days..., 1978), Shakespeare’s Hamlet (1981) and An-Sky’s Dybbuk (1988). The actor also collaborated with the younger generation: Krzysztof Babicki – the Father in Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Affabaluzione (1985), Tadeusz Miciński’s Termopile Polskie (1985) and with Krystian Lupa – Odysseus in Stanisław Wyspiański’s Return of Odysseus (1981), Joachim von Pasenov in Hermann Broch’s Sleepwalkers II (1998).
Between 1998 and 2000, Trela performed on the stage of the National Theatre. He performed in two plays directed by Jerzy Grzegorzewski, both on the basis of Stanisław Wyspiański’s dramatic plays: in The Judges (1999) as Samuel (a reprise of the same role from 1995) as well as Czepiec in The Wedding (2000). In 2002, he played the role of Prospero in W.H. Auden’s The Sea and the Mirror, once again directed by Grzegorzewski.
The actor’s career owes a lot to Kazimierz Kutz and the Polish Television Theatre. Trela played the Chief in Tadeusz Różewicz’s Do Piachu (1990), a loud, naturalistic portrayal of the nature of war. He also beautifully portrayed Stalin in Gaston Salvatore’s play of the same name.
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Trela – seemingly the same the whole time, stone-faced dangerous – but in fact cosntantly changing. He reached this effect through difficult means: through minimal changes in expression, in the eyes, through a grimace, a change in his gait and gesticulation.
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Dorota Terakowska, "Z fotela przed telewizorem", "Gazeta Krakowska" 9 marca 1992, nr 58
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Jerzy Trela’s Stalin doesn’t even have to perform, even in the improvised scenes based on ‘King Lear’ he doesn’t make an effort to accurately represent the text. Regardless, whether he’s joking or throwing out thoughts more dangerous than the barrel of a rifle, slow, emotionless words spill out from his motionless lips. And Trela conveys this terrifying calmness perfectly.
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Jacek Lutomski, "Łomnicki, Trela i Kutz", "Rzeczpospolita" 28 lutego 1992, nr 50
This wasn’t the first time Trela took on the character of the Soviet dictator. He had previously played him in the television play Children of the Arbat based on Anatoly Rybakov’s book (1989). Even here he built the character through minute, equally conservative gestures:
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Despite the play’s title, [Kazimierz Kutz] made Stalin the main character, interpreted by Jerzy Trela. Whilst in Rybakov’s story, the dictator has long monologues, the televised play simply shows Stalin and creates drama out of his figure alone.
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Atlas, "Kult jednostek", "Szpilki" 9 listopada 1989, nr 44
In Janusz Głowackis’ Antigone in New York, a ‘comedy about despair’ (also directed by Kazimierz Kutz), the protagonists are thrown out onto the margins of society, immigrant-hobos. Trela played Sasza, a Jew from St Petersburg and former painter. Andrzej Żurowski described the performance:
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An enormous, dazzling role. From the first moment, like a congealed mask. A scab, after water and after life. A mental block, the walk of a dying man. His acting is restrained, but even the slightest movement carries a clear intention. One such masterstroke is when he’s lying hungover and tense, until one sip – the eyelids lower in relief a fraction of a millimetre, his gaze straightens up, the voice relaxes and the monotone phrases loosen. Incredible. Even more incredible than the technique is that it is only the source of the virtuosity, giving the tools to precisely, almost unnoticeably, build a person. More than just a portrait: a labyrinth of the interior and more – a hyper-individual potrayal of mercy over despair, ruin and suffering from unextinguished dreams. Going far above the character’s shell.
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"Sztuka o rozpaczy", "Wiadomości Kulturalne" 26 lutego 1995, nr 9
Jerzy Trela performed in over 140 roles with the Polish Television Theatre. Amongst others, he played Wernyhora in Juliusz Słowacki’s The Silver Dream of Salomea (1994; dir. Krzysztof Nazar), Prophet Ilia in Tadeusz Słobocianek’s play of the same name (1994) as well as in Car Mikołaj (Tsar Nicholas, 1995) and Protagonist I in Tadeusz Różewicz’s Kartoteka Rozrzucona (1998, dir. Kazimierz Kutz). He also played the role of Henryk in Tadeusz Różewicz’s Moja Córeczka (2000, dir. Andrzej Barański).
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Trela performs grief caused by the loss of a child, who strayed onto the wrong path, but also shows the pain of a man suddenly aware that the world is not what he thought – it’s worse. Whilst complaining to God, he looks us straight in the eyes, transforming from a kind-hearted hick into a figure straight out of classical art.
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Zdzisław Pietrasik, “Dziecielina”, “Polityka” 16 grudnia 2000, nr 51
On the silver screen, he played Szymon Skiba in Paweł Pawlikowski’s Ida (2013) and Leon Wilczur in Grains of Truth (2015) and Albert Kukułka in Borys Lankosz’s Ciemno, Prawie Noc (2019). On stage, he performed in the ‘post-romantic The Polish Club, directed by Paweł Miśkiewicz (Dramatyczny Theatre, 2011), and played Lear in Who Will Pull the Hanged Man’s Card, Who the Jester? another work by Miśkiewicz based on Shakespeare’s texts (2015). On 27 November 2021, he performed in the premiere of Leonora Carrington’s The Hearing Trumpet, directed by Agnieszka Glinska.
Selected awards:
- 1976 – Main prize at the 16th Kaliskie Spotkanie Teatralne for his performance of Konrad in Stanisław Wyśpiański’s Wyzwolenie (dir. Konrad Swinarski) at the Stary Theatre in Kraków
- 1983 – Award from the Minister of Culture and Art for artistic achievement
- 1992 – Golden Wawrzyn Grzymały (award from Bydgoszcz Theatrical Society for best actors);
- 1997 – Award from Kraków Voivode for artistic achievements
- 2000 – Aleksander Zelwerowicz Award for his role as Samuel in Stanisław Wyspiański’s The Judges, directed by Jerzy Grzegorzewski at the National Theatre in Warsaw;
- Nagroda im. Aleksandra Zelwerowicza za rolę Samuela w Sędziach Stanisława Wyspiańskiego w reżyserii Jerzego Grzegorzewskiego w Teatrze Narodowym w Warszawie; Order of Polonia Restituta
- 2005 – Złoty Medal Gloria Artis – Zasłużony Kulturze; Nagroda za rolę Ericha Honeckera w słuchowisku Chrystus z Lobetal Leszka Wołosiuka w reżyserii Romany Bobrowskiej na 5. Festiwalu Teatru Polskiego Radia i Teatru Telewizji Polskiej “Dwa teatry” w Sopocie; Nagroda Ministra Kultury w dziedzinie teatru;
- 2007 – Gold Medal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis for his performance in Leszek Kołakowski’s Wielkie Kazanie Księdza Bernarda
- 2009 – Grand Prix for his role as King in Król Umiera, Czyli Ceremonie directed by Piotr Cieplak at the 49th Kaliskie Spotkanie Teatralne
- 2011 – Order of Polonia Restituta
Translated by AZ, May 2022