OSIECKA

dir. Robert Gliński, Michał Rosa, 2020

The thirteen-episode series Osiecka, directed by Michał Rosa and Robert Glinski, tells the story of several decades in the life of the poetess, Poland's most famous songwriter. The backdrop is the political and artistic events of the time, and each episode begins with something of a chronicle introducing the realities of the time. We meet the protagonist as a young girl, a student of journalism and an activist of the Union of Polish Youth. During this period, the role of Osiecka is played by Eliza Rycembel. The complicated relationship between her parents, Wiktor (played by Jan Frycz) and Maria (Maria Pakulnis), does not make adolescence any easier, when the girl is intensely searching for her own path. A young artist with her rebellious soul and uncompromising attitude does not particularly find her way among her peers. Her father takes care of her all-round development - Agnieszka is an excellent swimmer, learns foreign languages and has no complexes about voicing her opinions out loud. With time, she starts writing texts for the Student Theatre of Satirists (STS), with which she will be associated for several years. She also collaborates with the Bim-Bom student theatre in Gdańsk. During her studies at the Łódź Film School, she actively participates in the life of the artistic bohemia.

In turn, the role of the mature Osiecka was entrusted to Magdalena Poplawska. Throughout the episodes, the viewer accompanies her on her numerous journeys, her relationships with men, festivals and clashes with censorship, her moves and repeated returns with one suitcase to her family home, her tendency to alcohol and her attempt to bear the burden of motherhood, her illness and her last moments in hospital. In the character played by the two actresses, we look for similarities to Agnieszka Osiecka, whom we know from television programmes and radio broadcasts. We try to find her sense of humour, irony, sensitivity and extraordinary talent, but also that crack, the inner tug-of-war she talked about in her songs. Did the show's creators succeed in showing this? The voices are divided. It is not easy to tell the story of a person like Agnieszka Osiecka. There is no doubt that reaching out to a well-known, iconic figure for Polish culture is a difficult challenge, especially when many people close to the author are still alive and confronting the character portrayed on screen with their own memories of her. A gallery of characters connected to Osiecka at various times in her life, such as the aforementioned Marek Hłasko, Elżbieta Czyżewska, Zbyszek Cybulski, Jeremi Przybora, Seweryn Krajewski and Hanna Bakuła, scroll across the screen. The author's contemporary costumes and interiors are interestingly recreated.

Some of the scenes of the Osiecka series were filmed in Łódź, in the following locations:

Leon Schiller National Film, Television and Theatre School in Łódź, 61/63 Targowa Street

In this case, the Film School played itself. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Agnieszka Osiecka was a student at the Film Directing Department, and all the scenes associated with the School were actually filmed on Targowa Street. In the episode “Beautiful, twenty-year-old”, Osiecka waits on the lawn in front of the School for the result of her entrance exams. She accosts a passing professor and asks him to let her use the School's darkroom. There she develops a photograph of Marek Hłasko, taken in secret, which will accompany her for the next few months of her life. In one of the next scenes of the episode, she meets Hłasko in front of the rectorate building. After finding out about his trip to Kazimierz Dolny with another woman, she has no desire to talk to him. Wojtek Frykowski (Mikołaj Roznerski), whom the girl seems to be increasingly interested in, also starts to appear at the School. In the episode “I was joking” at Frykowski's invitation, Osiecka takes part in a dance party that takes place at the School, which is actually a film set for one of young Roman Polanski's etudes.

44 Targowa Street

In a courtyard that is part of the Scheibler housing complex, the young Agnieszka Osiecka shoots her first etude, “Solo on double bass”. The main role is played by an elderly man who appears with his double bass in various parts of the city. The director does not quite get along with the production crew. The presence of her new love, Wojtek Frykowski, who disparages ambitious cinema and the effort Osiecka puts into her work, does not help either.

Also immortalised in the frame is the former administration building of the Scheibler and Grohman factories opposite, which today houses the Academy of Art and Design in Łódź.

Biedermann Palace, ⅕ Franciszkańska Street

In the episode “Together to Paradise”, the factory owner's palace plays the role of a hotel where Marek Hłasko stays. Remaining in a drunken stupor, he calls Osiecka to tell her that he is at the bottom and dying. The girl packs the most necessary things into her handbag and arrives on the night train between Warsaw and Łódź to save her beloved. When she runs to his room, we see the representative staircase, the fireplace room and the corridor. Again we see the fireplace room in the scene in which Hłasko, dressed in his characteristic white sheepskin coat, tries to dissuade Osiecka from the idea of going to Paris.

Theodor Milsch Villa, 21 Łąkowa Street

In the restaurant “U Milscha”, located inside the villa, the lovers are having breakfast after an intoxicating night spent in the hotel (scenes shot in the Biedermann palace). The montage of shots from this scene suggests that this is a single location. Hłasko, who remains in a miserable mental state, reproaches Osiecka for her departure for Paris.

SPATiF,  33/35 Kościuszki Avenue

We can see the interiors of the pub on screen several times. In the episode “Beautiful, twenty-year-old” Osiecka, sitting at a table with her university friends, notices Marek Hłasko drinking in the other room. When he gets up and leaves, she hurriedly follows him and, in the stairwell, takes a picture of him from hiding. Developed in the darkroom of the Film School, it will accompany her through the period of her turbulent relationship with the writer. Again, we can see the Łódź SPATiF in the episode “I was joking”. Osiecka is sitting at the bar with a glass of wine when Wojtek Frykowski enters the room. Trying to make a bigger impression on the girl, he arranges a scene by making a deal with a random visitor to the premises. The stranger approaches Agnieszka and pusillanimously forces his company on her. At this point Frykowski steps in and heroically slaps him until he falls between the tables. Agnieszka is horrified and, rather than being grateful to her saviour, shows concern for the injured party. An impatient Frykowski forces him to say that everything is fine. In the continuation of the scene, the two are seated at a set table. Amant-the saviour charms the young Osiecka by telling her about an upcoming film they will be making together with a certain...Romek Polanski.

Bank Towarzystwa Wzajemnego Kredytu Przemysłowców Łódzkich, 15 Roosevelta Street

The operating theatre of the former bank was transformed for the series into ...a Los Angeles train station. Osiecka (played by Magdalena Popławska in later episodes), who is visiting friends in the United States, also meets the émigré Marek Hłasko. She cannot shake the bad impression this meeting leaves in her. Wishing to get out of the city, she goes to the railway station and asks at the window for a ticket to anywhere.