Krzysztof Warlikowski was born in Szczecin, Poland in 1962. After studying history and philosophy at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, he went on to study the history of theatre at the Ecole pratique des Hautes etudes in the Sorbonne in Paris. In 1989 he returned to Krakow to study directing at the Theatre Academy there and in 1992 directed his first plays: 'White Nights' by Dostoevsky and 'Autodafe' by Elias Canetti. In the years that followed, he collaborated with some of Europe's leading theatre directors: in 1992-93 he assisted Peter Brook in the production of 'Impressions de Pelleas' presented at the Bouffes du Nord in Paris and in workshops organized by Wiener Festwohen in Austria. In 1992, he also worked as assistant to Krystian Lupa in a production of 'Malte Laurids Brigge' by Rainer Maria Rilke at the Stary Teatr in Krakow. In 1994, Giorgio Strehler oversaw his adaptation and production of 'Recherche' by Proust at the Piccolo Teatro in Milan. He directed numerous works by Shakespeare, including 'The Merchant of Venice' (1994), 'A Winter's Tale' (1997), 'Hamlet' (1997 and 1999), 'The Taming of the Shrew' (1998), 'Twelfth Night' (1999), and 'The Tempest' (2003), in addition to 'Electra' by Sophocles (1996) and 'Cyclops' (1998) and 'The Bacchae' (2001) by Euripides. His modern and contemporary productions include 'The Trial by Kafka' (1995), 'Roberto Zucco' (1995) and 'Quai West' by Bernard-Marie Koltes (1998) as well as plays by Matei Visniec and Witold Gombrowicz. In 2001, he tackled the work of Sarah Kane for the first time, directing a production of 'Cleansed'. He has also directed many operas, such as 'The Music Programme' by Roxanna Panufnik, 'Don Carlos' by Verdi (2000), 'L'Ignorant et le Fou' by Pawel Mykietyn adapted from Thomas Bernhard (2001), 'Ubu Roi' by Krzysztof Penderecki (2003), 'Wozzeck' by Alban Berg (2005), 'Iphigenie en Tauride' by Christoph Willibald Gluck (2006), 'The Makropoulos Affair' by Leos Janacek (2007), and 'Eugene Onegin' by Tchaikovsky (2007). Krzysztof Warlikowski has worked in a number of different cities in Poland and theatres throughout Europe, including the Bouffes du Nord in Paris, the Piccolo in Milan, the Kammerspiele in Hamburg, and the Staatstheater in Stockholm, and in Zagabria (Croatia) and Israel. In 2003, with a company of French actors, he directed 'A Midsummer's Night Dream' at the Centre dramatique national in Nice and 'Le Dibbouk' at the Dialog Festival in Wroclaw. Later he staged 'Speaking in Tongues' by Andrew Bovell in Amsterdam, and Macbeth by Shakespeare at the Schauspiel in Hanover. At the Avignon Festival, Krzysztof Warlikowsky presented Hamlet in 2001, 'Cleansed' by Sarah Kane in 2002, 'Krum' by Hanokh Levin in 2005 and 'Angels in America' by Tony Kushner in 2007. Photo by Stefan Okolowicz