Polish actor Kościukiewicz to play Saint Francis
PR dla Zagranicy
Peter Gentle
07.07.2014 15:38
One of Poland’s top actors of the young generation, Mateusz Kościukiewicz, has been cast as Saint Francis in a biopic of one of the most venerated religious figures in history.
Mateusz Kościukiewicz: photo - Grzegorz Śledź/PR2
Filming of the two-episode TV series, to be shown on RAI Television in the autumn, is coming to a close this week. It is directed by one of Italy’s top filmmakers of the older generation, the eighty one year-old Liliana Cavani.
In an interview for Corriere della Sera she said that it took her many months to find an actor who would be able to portray St Francis’s “courageous rebellion against materialism and the lack of moral principles” from a modern perspective.
Having met Mateusz Kosciukiewicz at the Berlin Festival in February, the film’s casting director knew that he would be the perfect choice for the role of Saint Francis.
The twenty eight year-old actor was presented to the film industry and public in Berlin as one of the Shooting Stars 2014 named by the European Film Promotion (EFP) network. Kościukiewicz’s credits include ‘In the name of’ by Malgośka Szumowska, ‘All that I love’ by Jacek Borcuch and ‘Mother Teresa of the cats’ by Pawel Sala.
‘Francesco’ is Cavani’s third biopic of the Saint from Assisi. Her 1966 full-length feature film debut ‘Francesco d'Assisi’ starred Lou Castel in the title role. In 1989 she returned to the life of St Francis in ‘Francesco’, with Mickey Rourke as the title character and Helena Bonham-Carter as Chiara. (mk/pg)