It happened to me couple of times that when explaining where I come from, I was asked about famous people that Poland gave to the world. Of course the most natural answer that comes to the mind of an average Polish person is to mention individuals like Copernicus, Marie Curie, Chopin, Lech Walesa and John Paul II.

It proves, however, that mentality of the Poles is deeply attached to the history, great actions and great deeds that were part of Poles. But in the world of colorful magazines it is hard to expect that this answer would be enough. It might even happen that with time those names mentioned above will not bring any admiration or might not even remind of what great people they were. Today, when culture is designated and described by TV shows and gossip magazines, one needs to mention names of publicly known celebrities to prove that a given country exists.

Among a wide group of popular people, who come from Poland or have Polish roots, it is hard to choose only couple of names. However, for the aim at presenting some examples 3 individuals have been described below – a director, an actress and model.

ROMAN POLANSKI

He was born in 1933 in Paris in Jewish-Polish family that moved shortly after to Krakow. During the war Polanski spent his time in Krakow ghetto. Afterwards he hid in a village nearby Wadowice, what helped him to survive Nazi occupation. In 1960’ he moved to France (in 1975 he took French nationality), then Great Britain and in 1968 he left Europe to start his career in Hollywood. He is popular for films such as like Rosemary’s Baby, Chinatown, Frantic, The Ninth Gate or The Pianist. He became also known for accusations of his relationships with adolescence, that – especially recently – became top stories of numerous newspapers.

ALICJA BACHLEDA-CURUS

Alicja was born in 1983 in Mexico (as her father was working there at that time) as a child of known Polish family deriving from Polish Highlands. She went to school in Krakow and as a teenager started her career as actress (mostly known from film ‘Mr Tadeusz’ by Andrzej Wajda). Bachleda-Curus moved to the USA and played there some smaller or bigger parts in some movies (she played before also in German productions). She became known and popular (also in her homeland) due to her relationship with Colin Farrell. They met each other during filming the movie ‘Ondine’ where both of them played. In 2009 she gave birth to their son Henry Tadeusz.

JOANNA KRUPA

This Polish model was born in 1979 in Warsaw but left Poland at the age of five, when her mother moved to Chicago. As a teenager she moved to Los Angeles where she began her career as a model. She also played smaller parts in couple of American films. In 2009 Joanna took part in American show ‘Dancing with the Stars’. She has appeared on numerous magazine covers such as FHM, Maxim or Playboy.