Wałesa biopic gets special US Congress screening
PR dla Zagranicy
Peter Gentle
05.12.2013 09:17
Lech Wałęsa has attended a screening of a new movie of his life and work on US’s Capitol Hill, 24 years after making an historic address there as communism fell in Poland.
Former President of the Republic of Poland and Nobel Prize Laureate Lech WaĹÄsa (L) and former Democratic Senator from Connecticut and current President of the Motion Picture Association of America Chris Dodd (R) shake hands after speaking before a private screening of Andrzej Wajdaâs film 'Walesa: Man of Hope' at the US Capitol in Washington DC, USA, 04 December. Behind Walesa and Dodd is a photograph of the two of them from a meeting in 1983.: photo - EPA/JIM LO SCALZO
The screening of the film by veteran director Andrzej Wajda, Walesa. Man of Hope attracted an audience of several hundred politicians and dignitaries, including senator Barbara Mikulski, former senator Chris Dodd and former US national security adviser Zbigniew Brzeziński.
Before the show, which was organized jointly by the Polish Embassy in Washington and a group of US senators, Lech Wałęsa met with John Boehner, Speaker of the House of Representatives.
In November 1989, Wałesa made his historic address to lawmakers in the US shortly after the formation of the first Solidarity-led government in Warsaw.
He famously began his address with the words, "We, the people".
Asked by a Polish Radio reporter how he would open his address to Congress at the screening of Poland's Oscar nomination he replied: "We, the divided people", adding that he did not have the American nation in mind but the world community as a whole.
The famous speech of November 1989 ends Wajda's film, which was premiered in October. (mk/pg)