Józef „Żuk” Opalski

After Hours

director, music connoisseur

Prof. Józef Opalski – theatre scholar, musicologist, literary scholar, publicist, theatre director and festival organiser, teacher. Lecturer at the Faculty of Polish Studies at the Jagiellonian University, professor at the Stanisław Wyspiański Academy of Theatre Arts in Kraków. In artistic circles he is known as “Żuk”. With his extensive résumé, he could easily fill several biographies.

He has been a member of the ZASP Association since March 2004, for several years serving as a Board Member of the ZASP Kraków Branch and Head of the Artistic Council of the SPATiF Actor’s Club.

He was born in Kraków, where he completed primary school, high school and the Jagiellonian University, and where he first stepped onto a theatre stage (as a child he performed at the Słowacki Theatre).

A love for literature, music and theatre had been smouldering in him since his early years. These passions constantly competed with one another, and unwilling to give up any of them, he has served them all in different ways: directing, writing, teaching, organising and engaging in community work, which is also close to his heart. In this way, his passions fused with his professional fulfilment – a rare occurrence.

Since 1976 he has been a professor at the AST in Kraków at the Faculty of Drama Directing and the Acting Faculty. There, he founded the vocal-acting specialisation and – the first in Poland – musical theatre directing. He taught contemporary theatre at the Faculty of Radio and Television Directing in Katowice and, for two years (1980–82), was a lecturer in Polish at the University of Naples (since then, he has considered Italy his second homeland). He also lectured at UCLA in Los Angeles on contemporary European theatre and at the Paolo Grassi Drama School in Milan on contemporary Polish theatre.

In 1990 he created the Mrożek Festival in Kraków, serving as its director general and artistic director. He later served as artistic director of the European Month of Culture (1992), director of the 5th Festival of European Union Theatres (Kraków 1996), programme director of the “Kraków 2000” festival, and artistic director of the “Dedications” festival (held biennially since 2004). He was a member of the Programme Council of the Theatre of Entertainment in Chorzów (from 2000), and co-host of the Kraków Poetry Salon at the Słowacki Theatre (from 2002).

He has always been liked and admired, though as he says himself, he owes much of this to his great teachers and friends.

His university mentors were Professors Kazimierz Wyka and Jan Błoński.

His professional, creative and personal life was deeply shaped by friendships with Tadeusz Łomnicki, Maria Bojarska, Ewa Demarczyk, Sławomir Mrożek, Jan Kott, Anna Polony, Andrzej Seweryn, Gustaw Herling-Grudziński, Milva and Giorgio Strehler.

He learned theatre from the very best – Konrad Swinarski and Jerzy Jarocki were his great masters.

As he claims, working with students keeps him connected to the present through their perception of art. But he himself gives them a great deal – he is a demanding teacher, deeply dedicated to his students. He shares his passions with them, opens their eyes and ears, and awakens in them sensitivity to literature, music, theatre, and curiosity about the world and other people – without which true art cannot be created.

He cannot live without theatre! He not only observes it closely, evaluates it, and travels thousands of kilometres to see artistic events, but is also at the heart of this creative machinery – directing. His productions featuring texts by Bertolt Brecht and music by Kurt Weill captivated audiences with their theatricality, music and interpretation of the text. If we were to list all his productions here, musical theatre would dominate. When he is not directing himself, he often “supports” his fellow directors with his musical erudition and his huge music collection gathered over decades, creating musical arrangements for their productions. In his theatrum we encounter not only works originally intended for the stage. His active involvement in the Kraków Poetry Salon is living proof of his sensitivity to poetry and his desire to share it with everyone. This is another of his important traits – he wants people to take part in beautiful artistic experiences. Perhaps with the naïveté of a child, he believes that true art ennobles.

In recent years, he has written fewer critical texts on theatre, as his active participation in the creative process has made him a subject of criticism himself. However, it is important to remember that among his various written works, translations from French (including poetic translations of Édith Piaf’s songs) and Italian (e.g. Affabulazione by Pier Paolo Pasolini) hold a special place. He has been passionate about music for many years and is a declared audiophile. With his music collection and his achievements, he could easily rival many. As he wrote in an article for Dziennik Polski:

“First came Lucjan Kydryński’s ‘Song Revue’. Thanks to him, I learned to distinguish in songs what is beautiful and fascinating from the popular leftovers (which serve, let’s say, entertainment), what bears the signs of true art from the mediocrity that is so fashionable today. It was in the ‘Song Revue’ that I first heard Édith Piaf, Brel, Milva… and Eartha Kitt.”

Anyone who knows “Żuk” knows these are the Master’s lasting loves. He loves music deeply – musicals, actor’s song, classical music are only some of his fascinations. A wall of shelves bends under the weight of his music collection of the highest calibre, often impossible to find anywhere else. And truly, no one knows whether it is this music, or his many passions and interests, that continue to fuel his positive energy for life, people and art – art that he not only comments on, but is an immense part of.

Awards and distinctions:

Gold Cross of Merit
Silver Medal “Gloria Artis – Meritorious for Culture” (2006)
Golden Laurel for Mastery in Art
Karol Szymanowski Foundation Award
Award of the Minister of Higher Education (twice, for the books Chopin and Szymanowski in the Literature of the Interwar Period and Conversations on Konrad Swinarski and “Hamlet”)
Kraków City Award (2011)

We also recommend articles on Józef Opalski’s music:

The article was created with the kind assistance of Anna Stafiej

Prepared by
Julia Bromberek

Józef „Żuk” Opalski

See also