The history of a Friendship

On January 11 of this year, a friend of John Paul II from Krakow, Prof. Danuta Michałowska went to eternity. Their friendship was born during the war. During that time they met secretly at the rehearsals and performances of the Theatre of the Word. Karol Wojtyła chose a spiritual vocation, Michałowska remained faithful to the theatre for the rest of her life.

As a person interested in the life and literary works of Karol Wojtyła, I asked Danuta Michałowska in the winter of 2005, to give me an interview about the Pope. Our first meeting took place in her modest home, full of books. It lasted about five hours. She could speak of her friend beautifully. On this occasion she spoke of a literary evening with Wojtyła on A Poplar Bridge Alongside A Road (Drogą topolowy most), which is the fifth part of The King-Spirit (Król-Duch), about Karol Wojtyła in his youth. She also spoke about her impressions from meetings with the Holy Father in the Vatican. There were moments of great emotion, sometimes one of us shed a tear.

In the year 2006, I had almost regular meetings with Danuta. I called her “Danuta” because she wanted us to relate on a first name basis. An almost fifty-year difference in age did not bother her. We undertook working on her monodrama A Dove in the Rocky Clefts” (Gołębica w rozpadlinach skalnych). I translated it into Italian. Danuta studied Italian in order to make an audio recording of the translated text, herself. She had great pronunciation, excellent intonation, and a flawless sense of pauses. She said that the Holy Spirit was helping her. Every time I came to see her, I felt she was waiting for me. She was always smartly dressed, arranged her hair and had light makeup on.

At each meeting, we talked about the Pope. Once she wondered if she should address her prayer to “Lolek” or to “John Paul”. Another time, she said that Karol had had only two suits, one he used for work and one he wore at premieres in the theatre, but he had never worn a tie and his shirt button at the neck, had been always unfastened. One time she discussed Wojtyłas’ apartment at Tyniecka Street calling it “a house of the poor” and another time she recalled that birthdays in their youth had not been celebrated. She also described vividly their other mutual friends: Julian Kydryński was amorous, Wojtek Żukrowski, a charming man with a sense of humor, intelligent and witty. There was also Tadeusz Kwiatkowski who belonged to their pack and during the war they saw each other almost every day.

I have very fond memories of our many hours of walking on the banks of the Vistula River. As it happened, we attended masses together in Italian at the Franciscan Church or we walked to the cinema to watch films she claimed every Pole should see such as, Katyń by Wajda, or the film Generał Nil which featured one of her beloved students the actor Olgierd Łukaszewicz in the leading role, or a film about Father Popiełuszko. I witnessed her receive many prestigious titles and awards, just to mention two of them: the Master of Polish Language (Mistrz Mowy Polskiej) and Honorary Citizenship of the City of Krakow.

The last journey abroad that we had together was with the Rector of the Jagiellonian University Prof. Jacek Popiel. It was to Rome, where, on 7 March 2010, a conference The Theatre of Karol Wojtyła took place in the framework of the two-year cycle of meetings Papal Evenings at the Church of St. Stanislaus organized by the John Paul II Foundation and the Center for Documentation and Research of the Pontificate of John Paul II in Rome. The organizer of the meetings was Dr. Anna Karoń-Ostrowska. I do not know whether a recording of Wojtyła’s poem Stanisław, masterly performed by Michałowska, has been preserved. The papers presented at that conference may be read in the publication, It is Beautiful to Serve. A Spiritual Heritage of John Paul II (Pięknie jest służyć. Dziedzictwo duchowe Jana Pawła II), published under the editorship of Fr. Andrew Dobrzyński in 2013. From my memories in Rome with Danuta, I will keep forever the most poignant one, a pilgrimage to the tomb of John Paul II.

Danuta made two final performances of note. The last artistic performance of Michałowska, alongside Piotr Adamczyk, took place on 22 October 2010 in the Archdiocese Museum in Krakow, when both of them presented, in Polish and Italian, Roman Triptych (Tryptyk rzymski) of John Paul II. On September 7/8, 2012 there was A Night of Poetry, which included fragments of Juliusz Słowacki’s Beniowski. This was performed on the stage of her beloved Ludwik Solski State Drama School in Krakow. However, the actress was not satisfied with her performance here and was concerned about it being a good farewell to her audience.

The 90th birthday of Michałowska was celebrated by Krakow on 7 January 2013. A large numbers of representatives of the world of culture, especially of the theatre, came to this event. There were many warm speeches, words of appreciation and gratitude. Every speaker had a lot to thank her for. Jacek Popiel, an author of books on Michałowska, recalled the most interesting facts from the biography of the birthday celebrant and confidently proclaimed that we were dealing with a person who was a national treasure. She was too weak to celebrate the next birthday, and her final one preceded her passing by only a few days. She died at the age of 92 on 11th January 2015. Five days later, the funeral service was held, presided over by Cardinal Stanisław Dziwisz, Archbishop of Krakow. Once again, almost the entire artistic community, even that beyond Krakow, was gathered around her. It is my fervent hope that the memory of Danuta Michałowska will be cultivated by her spiritual heirs and worthily passed on to younger generations. I hope that the words of John Paul II, “someone should write about Michałowska’s theology of drama”, will be realized some day.