V

search for her missing photojournal-
ist husband in war-torn Croatia.
Harrison's Flowers, recently playing at
local theaters, was directed by the
French Jewish filmmaker Elie
Chouraqui, and stars David Straitharn
as MacDowell's Jewish husband.
"Although my character is not kid-
napped and used as Daniel Pearl was,
I hope this story illuminates the dan-
gers journalists are in when they take
these incredible responsibilities,
going into horrible situations, to get
the truth out," Strathairn has said.
Chouraqui clearly had a personal
response to the genocide in Bosnia.
"I am Jewish and this was like Hitler
all over again in the Eastern Bloc in
1991," Chouraqui has remarked.
Polanski actually survived the
Holocaust, while losing his mother
in Auschwitz.
"Roman has had more than his
share of injustices, yet he still has
this optimism and enthusiasm for
life that I haven't seen in anyone,"
Brody marvels. "He is an incredibly
tough individual, tough beyond the
physical sense. He can really with-
stand a lot."

First Leading Role

Although The Pianist is not P olanski's
story, Brody drew on aspects of the
director's character for his portrayal
of Szpilman.
"Szpilman is not based on Roman
but I incorporated a lot of his
strength and his personality, and a lot
of that was probably without his
knowledge," Brody confides. "I was
absorbing it without making it very
clear that I was studying him."
Brody felt enormous pressure dur-
ing the filming of The Pianist, prima- .
rily because it was his first major
leading role. He was also aware that
several well-known European actors
had wanted the part, and that he was

In "Harrison's
Flowers," Adrien
Brody plays a
free-spirited
photographer
helping Andie
MacDowell search
for her missing
photojournalist
husband in
war-torn Croatia.

the only American involved in any
aspect of the production.
"I basically had what my dream
was — what I'd been working toward
since I was 12 — a role of that depth
and that caliber, with the respect of a
master filmmaker who had a tremen-
dous amount of trust and faith in me
and hired me against a lot of odds,"
Brody explains.
At the same time, Brody realized
that this was Polanski's first film
dealing with the Holocaust, late in a --
career spanning more than three
decades.
The actor, who composes and
sequences his own music with a com-
puter-based keyboard, took piano
lessons every day of the shoot. With
quiet pride, he discloses that he
learned to play some difficult
Chopin pieces — although he doesn't
read music — for The Pianist.
Brody, whose father is Jewish, was-
n't raised in a religious home. But
filming The Pianist in Eastern
Europe was clearly a profound expe-
rience.
"I'd already known a great deal
about the Holocaust," Brody says,
"but that solidified my connection to
those roots."
While Brody may not have been
taught Jewish rituals as a child, he
was educated in principles of social
justice. His mother, Sylvia Plachy,
escaped from Hungary in the '50s
and has had a lengthy tenure as a
photojournalist for the Village Voice.
"My mother is underpaid and
underappreciated, in my opinion, but
she only does what she believes in,"
Brody avers. "She doesn't shoot fash-
ion or do any of those things which
would pay her a great deal more
money and give her a lot more expo-
sure. She goes for the raw assign-
ments and I guess I inherited that
desire." I

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