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Remember the old days... in West Bloomfield we are now serving antipasto plates on every table in addition to soup or salad, side of pasta, potato & vegetable that comes with every entree. 1/ 3 2003 58 248.626.6969 6480 ORCHARD LAKE ROAD • W. BLOOMFIELD • Just North of Male GERMAN SOLDIER from page 54 everything; so then I see this film and I can't stop crying. This film is not just a great film. I think it's also a history lesson every- one should see. JN: How do young Germans today view that period? TK: Well, it's always young, young people who tend to be bored of it because they hear about it all the time and there is always this talk — isn't it enough? No, its not enough. But I have the feeling Germans [feel] the responsibility for the past. This film is doing great in Germany. Germans don't like films — like a big Hollywood film — where Germans run around and kill people and [the German is] just like the ugly guy, where he's always being the sym- bol of the ugliness in the World. But [a film] like this that takes the subject seriously and is true about it and is honest, they like it very much. It's doing incredible. It started in the art houses and expanded. It's in its fifth week now and they're sold out. JN: How did you feel, then, about seeing the many brutal German char- acters portrayed in The Pianist? TK: Well, I was very happy to have this part. JN: Did you have any relatives who served in the German army during World War II? TK: My grandfather was in the army. He deserted and took my family, moved my family all over Germany. He was carrying his mother, who was in a wheelchair. He could have been shot for [deserting]. So I feel kind of lucky because as a German, you ask yourself, "How would I react?" And obviously, you look back and ask yourself how is it possible that a whole nation got behind this lunatic (Hitler) and followed him. JN: How much did you know about your character in the film and what did you do to prepare for the role? TK: There was the diary (included in the re-published memoir) and the let- ters of Hosenfeld. I read them and I saw there were some things that showed how really great he was. I go to Roman and say, "What do you think?" And he says, "No." For me it was a really easy shoot because it lasted only one- and-a-half weeks, and he didn't want me to pre- pare myself. I had an amazing director who was right all the time. JN: What directions did he give you? TK: Well, he was really precise about everything. The major thing was, before the first shot, he comes behind me and whispers in my ear, "You do the same thing you did during the casting." "But I didn't act," I told him. "Exactly," Roman said. "The major thing: don't act." The second thing was he wanted to keep it kind of ambivalent, like neu- tral. You don't understand when you're shooting it, but when you see the whole film, you understand how right he is. When I got the script, I thought I was going to shoot it in English. Then he wasn't quite sure on the set and then we ended up shooting [my lines] in German. He thought it made it more real, more precise. It's interesting, too, because a lot of people who see the film forget after- ward that I speak in German, which I think is great. In films, the German language is always used da da da da da da (spo- ken in harsh tones). Here I can speak like a human being. - - - - JN: How familiar were you with Adrien Brody? TK: I'd seen him in films. I was very excited to work with him because I've never seen him bad. He's a good actor. Years back, I was always surprised how American actors are able to express these deep feelings, because the whole [Hollywood] environment is so shallow. So I was kind of wondering about a boy from New York who didn't grow up with the music, with all the stories, the buildings, the grandparents, with the furniture even — [Europeans] are emotionally so much closer to it than I can imagine any American would be. For me, the biggest surprise was how much he could [transport] him- self into this and how much he felt it and he knew it. • It got to the point where I spoke German to him. He learned his dia- logue and asked me from time to time how to pronounce this or that. I heard him talking and there were times he sounded like my grandmoth- er, who was Polish. The accent — it gave me the creeps. ❑