Voytek, or Wojciech Roman Pawel Jerzy Szendzikowski was born in

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

on 15 January 1925 and died in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

on 7 August 2014. He was a leading production designer, for British stage and television, for which he also directed, wrote and produced.

Career

Son of Wladyslaw, a doctor, and Maria Szendzikowski, Wojciech was born and spent his childhood and adolescence in Warsaw. As a teenage partisan during World War 2, he was awarded the Polish Cross of Valour in the

Warsaw Uprising The Warsaw Uprising ( pl, powstanie warszawskie; german: Warschauer Aufstand) was a major World War II operation by the Polish resistance movement in World War II, Polish underground resistance to liberate Warsaw from German occupation. It occ ...

of 1944. Sustaining a shoulder wound, he was captured and held as a prisoner of war in Germany. His wartime experience left its mark on the wry humour which infused his later work, a Brechtian political irony focused on class. After liberation, Voytek walked to Italy, where he joined the exiled Polish army and formed a theatre group. Arriving in Scotland in 1946, he enrolled at Dundee Art College, before joining the

Old Vic Old or OLD may refer to: Places *Old, Baranya, Hungary * Old, Northamptonshire, England *Old Street station, a railway and tube station in London (station code OLD) *OLD, IATA code for Old Town Municipal Airport and Seaplane Base, Old Town, Ma ...

's Theatre School the following year as a stage design student. There, his primary mentor was

Margaret Harris Margaret Frances Harris (28 May 1904 – 10 May 2000) was an English theatre and opera costume and scenic designer. Biography Early years Harris was born in Hayes, Kent, the fourth child and second daughter of William Birkbeck Harris, a Ll ...

Motley Motley is the traditional costume of the court jester, the motley fool, or the arlecchino character in ''commedia dell'arte''. The harlequin wears a patchwork of red, green and blue diamonds that is still a fashion motif. The word ''motley'' i ...

. The theatre director

George Devine George Alexander Cassady Devine (20 November 1910 – 20 January 1966) was an English theatrical manager, director, teacher, and actor based in London from the early 1930s until his death. He also worked in TV and film. Early life and education ...

suggested 'Voytek' as his professional soubriquet, as 'nobody could pronounce or remember his real name'.''Designed by Voytek'', interview with Arthur Hawkey, http://abcatlarge.co.uk/designed-by-voytek/ After a period in the mask and costume department of London's Arts Theatre, he took an extended contract in

repertory A repertory theatre is a theatre in which a resident company presents works from a specified repertoire, usually in alternation or rotation. United Kingdom Annie Horniman founded the first modern repertory theatre in Manchester after withdrawing ...

at the

Nottingham Playhouse Nottingham Playhouse is a theatre in Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England. It was first established as a repertory theatre in 1948 when it operated from a former cinema in Goldsmith Street. Directors during this period included Val May and Fr ...

as a set and costume designer, where his work attracted attention for its bold, 'metafictional' style: as he put it, 'I believe the Theatre is the essence of reality rather than a mediocre copy of our environment'. He subsequently began designing for television and cinema, where many of his main achievements were to lie. Over the seven years from 1958 he designed more than 40

Armchair Theatre ''Armchair Theatre'' is a British television drama anthology series of single plays that ran on the ITV network from 1956 to 1974. It was originally produced by ABC Weekend TV. Its successor Thames Television took over from mid-1968. The Canadi ...

plays for

ABC Television ABC Television most commonly refers to: *ABC Television Network of the American Broadcasting Company, United States, or *ABC Television (Australian TV network), a division of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Australia ABC Television or ABC ...

, working with cutting-edge directors such as

Philip Saville Philip Saville (28 October 1927 – 22 December 2016) was a British director, screenwriter and former actor whose career lasted half a century. The British Film Institute's Screenonline website described Saville as "one of Britain's most prolifi ...

. He worked on plays featuring many stars of the era including

Diana Dors Diana Dors (born Diana Mary Fluck; 23 October 19314 May 1984) was an English actress and singer. Dors came to public notice as a blonde bombshell, much in the style of Americans Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield and Mamie Van Doren. Dors was pr ...

Patrick Macnee Daniel Patrick Macnee (6 February 1922 – 25 June 2015) was a British film and television actor. After serving in the Royal Navy during World War II, he began his acting career in Canada. Despite having some small film roles, Macnee spent much ...

and

Leo McKern Reginald "Leo" McKern, Order of Australia, AO (16 March 1920 – 23 July 2002) was an Australian actor who appeared in numerous British, Australian and American television programmes and films, and in more than 200 stage roles. His notabl ...

, with screenplays written by

William Saroyan William Saroyan (; August 31, 1908 – May 18, 1981) was an Armenian-American novelist, playwright, and short story writer. He was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1940, and in 1943 won the Academy Award for Best Story for the film ''The ...

, Michael Meyer and many other young writers. In 1961, he won a Guild of Television Producers and Directors Award for his contribution to the series; while the same year he collected the TV drama design Bafta for ''The Rose Affair'', a modern, styled version of ''Beauty and the Beast''. He also designed several feature films, including ''

Cul-de-sac A dead end, also known as a cul-de-sac (, from French for 'bag-bottom'), no through road or no exit road, is a street with only one inlet or outlet. The term "dead end" is understood in all varieties of English, but the official terminology ...

'' (1966), directed by

Roman Polanski Raymond Roman Thierry Polański , group=lower-alpha, name=note_a (né Liebling; 18 August 1933) is a French-Polish film director, producer, screenwriter, and actor. He is the recipient of numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, two ...

. Such was his prestige, that he made the unusual career move into direction, with credits including episodes of ''

Callan Callan is a given name and surname of Irish and Scottish origin. It can derive from Ó Cathaláin, meaning ''descendant of Cathalán''. Callan can also be an Anglicized form of the Gaelic Mac Allin or Mac Callin. Notable people with the name includ ...

'', '' Man at the Top'', ''

The Mind of Mr. J.G. Reeder ''The Mind of Mr. J.G. Reeder'' is a British television series which was originally broadcast on ITV in two series from 1969 to 1971. It is based on a series of novels and short stories written by Edgar Wallace featuring the character of J.G. Re ...

'', ''

The Incredible Adventures of Professor Branestawm ''Incredible Adventures'' is a collection by Algernon Blackwood, comprising three novellas and two short stories. It was originally published by Macmillan Publishers, Macmillan in 1914 and reprinted in 2004 by Hippocampus Press. H. P. Lovecraft wro ...

'', ''

Tales of Mystery and Imagination ''Tales of Mystery & Imagination'' (often rendered as ''Tales of Mystery and Imagination'') is a popular title for posthumous compilations of writings by American author, essayist and poet Edgar Allan Poe and was the first complete collection of ...

'', (''Frankenstein)'', ''

Crown Court The Crown Court is the court of first instance of England and Wales responsible for hearing all Indictable offence, indictable offences, some Hybrid offence, either way offences and appeals lied to it by the Magistrates' court, magistrates' court ...

'' and ''

Special Branch Special Branch is a label customarily used to identify units responsible for matters of national security and Intelligence (information gathering), intelligence in Policing in the United Kingdom, British, Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth, ...

''. As a producer, he took charge of the 1967 TV adaptation of Bunyan's ''

Pilgrim's Progress ''The Pilgrim's Progress from This World, to That Which Is to Come'' is a 1678 Christian allegory written by John Bunyan. It is regarded as one of the most significant works of theological fiction in English literature and a progenitor of ...

'' and also wrote several TV scripts. His later stage work included

Ronald Eyre Ronald Eyre (13 April 1929 – 8 April 1992) was an English theatre director, actor and writer. Biography Eyre was born at Mapplewell, near Barnsley, Yorkshire and he taught at Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School, Blackburn and Giggleswick Sch ...

's production of ''

Much Ado About Nothing ''Much Ado About Nothing'' is a comedy by William Shakespeare thought to have been written in 1598 and 1599.See textual notes to ''Much Ado About Nothing'' in ''The Norton Shakespeare'' ( W. W. Norton & Company, 1997 ) p. 1387 The play ...

'' for the

Royal Shakespeare Company The Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) is a major British theatre company, based in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England. The company employs over 1,000 staff and produces around 20 productions a year. The RSC plays regularly in London, St ...

in 1971, and ''The Marquis of Keith'' by Wedekind (1974, also for the RSC). In 1983 he won a

Critics' Circle Theatre Award The Critics' Circle Theatre Awards, originally called ''Drama'' Theatre Awards up to 1990, are British theatrical awards presented annually for the closing year's theatrical achievements. The winners, from theatre throughout the United Kingdom, ar ...

for best designer, for his set for

Botho Strauss Botho Strauß (; born 2 December 1944) is a German playwright, novelist and essayist. Biography Botho Strauß's father was a chemist. After finishing his secondary education, Strauß studied German, History of the Theatre and Sociology in Colo ...

's ''Great and Small'' at the

Vaudeville Theatre The Vaudeville Theatre is a West End theatre on the Strand in the City of Westminster. As the name suggests, the theatre held mostly vaudeville shows and musical revues in its early days. It opened in 1870 and was rebuilt twice, although each ...

, which was set inside a massive, plastic tower doubling as a prison cage. He won his second Bafta for production design on the LWT miniseries ''

Dandelion Dead ''Dandelion Dead'' is a British TV mini-series produced by LWT for ITV that aired in two parts on 6 and 13 February 1994. It tells the true story of Herbert Rowse Armstrong, a solicitor in the provincial town of Hay-on-Wye, Wales, who was convi ...

'' (1994), after which he retired from television work.

Personal life

His first wife was Renee Bergmann, an actor, with whom he had three children, Stefan, Joe and Julie. The marriage ended in divorce in 1971, as did his second marriage to Fionnuala (née Kenny), with whom he had a daughter, Taya.

References

External links

* * Victoria and Albert Museum, ''Voytek Archive'', https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1162873/voytek-archive-1947-1990-poster-voytek/) * BAFTA ''in memory of Voytek'', https://www.bafta.org/heritage/in-memory-of/voytek) {{Authority control 1925 births 2014 deaths British television directors Film people from Warsaw Polish emigrants to the United Kingdom