Her career.
"My whole life is an enormous surprise to me. I was admitted to the prestige theatre school, on the first year I started my individual tutorials and I graduated with the first class honour... I come from the countryside, from the working class background. I grew up with inferiority complex thinking that I am worse, uglier, less smart. However, over time it turned out that I had imagination which was quite original. My chose of roles seemed to appeal to the audience.
Setting up my my own theatre company sprang from a sense of protest. A relation that grow up from desire to unconstrained self impression. Today my „Theatre Polonia" is the most popular in Warsaw.
30 years of professional practice has taught me that I must be strong in my self-believe. In my life I go by principles of simplicity and truth."
Working under communism. Janda first achieved national recognition having played in „Man of Marble" in 1976. This film was very critical of the communist regime and was strongly disapproved of by the authorities. Janda was associated with opposition political circles and never bound the pressure to conform.
"Having played Agnieszka's role in "Man of Marbel" it had became clear which side I was on . Directors who supported the regime were not allowed to cast me. This situation taught me to choose roles very carefully and peruse scenarios so I did not get involved in something I would be ashamed of afterwards. I can stand over every word spoken by characters I have played.
At that time I worked outside of Poland quite a lot. At each boarder crossing I was searched. The authorities wanted to remind me of who was in charge. Fortunately the authorities assumed that actors are not important which allowed me to blame directors for everything. Bugajski got the one way ticket out of Poland as a result of my role in his film „Interrogation".
Strange things were happening in my life at that time. My apartment was broken into on a number of occasions. It did not realise what was going on, I blamed my absent mindedness for loosing keys. Later I realized that there had been search operations by the authorities.
From a personal point of view, the greatest set back resulting from my political opinions was not being allowed to act in "Sophies Choice".
Freedom Regained
I had thought that Poland as a free market economy would be a better place. I had never expected that so many narrow minded people would end up in charge of the country. This is the biggest disappointment in my life.
Working with Krzysztof Kieślowski.
I could talk about it for hours. He was an extremely precise and meticulous person. During shooting, people worked in silence, calmly, thoughtfully. He would not tolerate melodrama. I knew instinctively how to act for him. The editing room was his kingdom.
On the other side of the barricade, directing.
I did "Keranel" based on the Anka Kowalska book for pleasure. Many of my friends had experienced problems with their relationships similar to characters in the book. I thought it was an important issue, but none of the directors could even get through the book, so I did it myself.
Nonetheless I do not take my self seriously as a director. However, television producers love me. I am disciplined, I work within budgets and deadlines. But as a director I sacrifice my acting so the over all outcome works well.
In this theatre season I am directing two plays. „God" by Woody Allen is one of them and it is one of the funniest plays about theatre. Allen will 'give' us his voice which, pre-recorded, will be played at the appropriate moment during the play.
Writing on the Internet.
It is all about public relations. The media create public images that are not necessarily true so I decided to create my own. I have not updated my blog for a year now, but I know that people are waiting for the next entry. Relationships developed on the Internet are precious. The people I get to know online later come to see my plays. The amount of visits to my website equate to the readership of a popular womens magazine.
Balancing her public and private life.
My professional success would not have been possible without my mother helping to raise my three children. Family is very important to me, spending quality time with my children. It is never compromised with my professional commitments. Having said that sometimes I am so being busy that I feel like a guest in my own home who asks "what are we having for dinner tonight?" or "what are we up to for the weekend?"
At the end of the meting Krzysztof Zanussi summarizes: „Krystyna Janda is an extremely accomplished person, but she is also very approachable and easy to communicate with. Not only talented she is also generous of spirit although she makes a point of not publicising her charitable work.
