Roman Polanski

Roman Polanski, born in 1933, Polish motion-picture director, known for his psychological dramas and dark comedies and for his difficult personal life. Born in Paris, France, to Polish parents, Polanski moved to Kraków, Poland, at the age of three. When he was eight years of age, his parents were taken to German concentration camps, where his mother was killed. He was reunited with his father when he was 12 years old. At the age of 14 he became a stage actor, and he later studied at the Łódź Film School in Poland.

Polanski's first full-length film as a director was Noz w wodzie (Knife in the Water, 1962), which attracted international attention and was nominated for an Academy Award for best foreign language film (1963). He then directed three films in England, including Repulsion (1965), a story of a woman's descent into madness, starring French actor Catherine Deneuve. His American debut, the horror film Rosemary's Baby (1968), was critically acclaimed and a commercial success. Polanski's best-known Hollywood film, Chinatown (1974), is a detective thriller starring American actor Jack Nicholson and Polanski himself in the small role of a gangster.

In 1969 Polanski's wife, American actor Sharon Tate, and several of their friends were murdered by American cult-leader Charles Manson and his followers in Los Angeles, California. After a period of inactivity following the murders, Polanski reemerged in 1971 with a violent adaptation of Macbeth, the classic tragedy by English playwright William Shakespeare. In 1977 Polanski became involved in a scandal after pleading guilty to a charge of unlawful intercourse with a minor in the Los Angeles area. He fled bail and has continued to make films in Europe, including Tess (1979)—adapted from the novel Tess of the d'Urbervilles by British writer Thomas Hardy—Frantic (1988), Bitter Moon (1992), and Death and the Maiden (1995). Polanski also received critical acclaim for The Pianist (2002), based on the true story of a young musician who—like Polanski—lived through the Nazi occupation of Poland during World War II. The film earned Polanski his first Academy Award for best director.