Film and theatre director, screenwriter.
Born in Warsaw as Henoch Szapiro, he spent his youth in Russia, graduating from high school in Saratov, then from the Institute of Communication Engineers in Petrograd, and then from the renowned school at the Alexandrinsky Theatre. He likely later moved to Moscow, where he trained as an assistant to Vsevolod Meyerhold, a proponent of constructivism in theatre, and to Arbatov. In the early 20s, he directed his first productions on the stages of Petrograd theatres.
In 1923, he moved to Berlin, where he joined the Russian emigre cabaret Sinaja Ptica ("Blue Bird"). When the group returned to Poland to perform a year later, Szaro decided to settle permanently in Warsaw. He took the position of artistic director at the capital's literary theater, "Stańczyk." There, he directed, among other plays, two one-act plays by Russian playwright Nikolai Yevreinov: "The Merry Death" and "The School of Stars," in which he experimentally used film photography. Henryk Szaro co-founded the Polish Association of Film Producers (1927), from which he left in 1936 and founded the Association of Film Producers and Technicians. He also became an honorary member of the French Union des Artistes Cinematographiques in Nice (1929).
Henryk Szaro | Public domain.
His film debut was "The Rivals" (1925), in which Eugeniusz Bodo made his screen debut. Szaro directed a total of 15 films, including seven silent films. A significant portion of his work consists of adaptations of Polish novels, stage plays, and folk legends: "The Red Clown" (1926), "The Savage" (1928), "Ordynat Michorowski" (1937), "The Three Rogues" (1937), "Mr. Twardowski" (1936), "The Story of Sin" (1933), "The Coming Spring" (1928), and "The Strong Man" (1929). It was this adaptation of Stanisław Przybyszewski's novel that proved to be Szaro's greatest success, today considered one of the greatest works of Polish silent cinema. The director drew on the achievements of German Expressionism, the avant-garde, and the Soviet school of editing. He also tried his hand at entertainment ("The Call of the Sea," 1927) and patriotic films (in collaboration with the Kineton Sfinks company) – "To Siberia" (1930) and "1914" (1934). He tackled Jewish themes in "One of the 36" (1925), referencing the so-called Lamed Voivodeship, and "The Vow," a film shot in Yiddish with a guest performance by the Choir of the Great Synagogue of Warsaw.
After the outbreak of World War II, he moved to Vilnius, but after the outbreak of the German-Soviet war, he returned to Warsaw in the first half of 1942. He settled in the ghetto on Pańska Street. During the liquidation of refugees from the East, he was dragged from his apartment along with his father-in-law, Goldman, and shot in the street. The exact date of his death is unknown; it was likely April, June, or July 1942.
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