Antoni Bohdziewicz

Who was Antoni Bohdziewicz?

Antoni Bohdziewicz was a Polish-Lithuanian screenplay writer and director, best known for his 1956 adaptation of Zemsta by Aleksander Fredro.

Bohdziewicz was born in the city of Vilnius, Lithuania, then part of the Russian Empire. In 1928, he graduated from the Technical Faculty of the Warsaw University of Technology and was simultaneously studying at the Faculty of Humanities of the Stefan Batory University. In 1928, he became a speaker at the newly established branch of the Polish Radio in his native city. In 1931 however he obtained a state scholarship and left for France. In Paris he joined the prestigious Ecole Technique de Photographie et de Cinématographie, where he also made his first documentaries.

In 1935, he returned to Poland and worked as a journalist and cameraman for the state-owned Polska Agencja Telegraficzna Film Chronicle, the most popular newsreel in Poland. He also worked as a journalist and columnist for the "Pion" weekly. In late 1930s he made numerous documentaries for the PAT agency, as well as for the SAF film studio. In 1939, he began working on his first feature film Zazdrość i medycyna, based on a novel by Michał Choromański.