Pole Slain In Mass Murder Was Playboy In Native Land
Fled Bankrupt Society
August 12, 1969
By Jerry Cohen
Times Staff Writer
The name Voyteck Frykowski meant little here until he died last weekend, a
victim of the mass murders in Benedict Canyon.
But in his native Poland he was, at the age of 37, something of a legend
among sophisticates who chafe at the Communist establishment.
"In Poland, where it's not easy to be a playboy, he had style," said a close
friend. "In Warsaw's artistic society, he was as well-known as Roman Polanski
(the movie director whose wife, Sharon Tate was another of the mass-murder
victims).
He was the Polish version of a Hemmingway hero.
"He drove sports racecars. He was bright, witty and attractive. He real
he-man. He wasn't an intellectual, but he was the kind of guy intellectuals like
to have around. He was good company. Women loved him."
Frykowski married twice in Poland before coming to the United States two
years ago. A former wife was Agnieszka Osiecka (1936-1997), one of that
country's most popular writers.
As a youth, Frykowski met Polanski and became one of the filmmakers close
friends. Together they gravitated to the small set of artists, writers and
actors that survived- and with flair- "the barrenness and bankruptcy of
contemporary Polish society," said a mutual friend.
"Voyteck's father had a fair amount of money, more than most in Poland, and he
was able to help finance some of Polanski's earlier films," the friend added.
"But the heavy hand of censors and of course, that bankrupt society drove out
an enormous number of talented men in their late 20's and early 30's.
Polanski and Frykowski were among them.
After arriving in the US, Frykowski spent the first eight months in NYC,
where he became a fixture in the swinging circle of talented but hedonistic
Polish émigrés. That circle later moved westward. "This world tended to orbit
around him," said the friend. "It was made up of a lot bright, attractive young
people. It was a sensual, not an intellectual world, and it was marijuana
oriented," the friend said.
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