Wojciech Frykowski

Wojciech "Voytek" Frykowski (born December 22, 1936 in Łódź , Poland , † August 9, 1969 in Los Angeles , California , USA ) was a Polish actor and writer . He became known as one of the victims of the murder of actress Sharon Tate and others by the Manson Family (see Tate murders ).

Life

Wojciech Frykowski (the nickname "Voytek" represents the Anglicization of the Polish diminutive "Wojtek" of his first name "Wojciech"), a son of Polish textile manufacturers, was a school friend of the Polish director and actor Roman Polański . Like Polański, Frykowski had survived the horror of persecution by the National Socialists in Germany-occupied Poland .

Frykowski was married and divorced twice. The son Bartłomiej Frykowski (1959–1999), who later became a cameraman, comes from the first marriage with the Polish model Ewa Maria Morelle . His second marriage was to the Polish author Agnieszka Osiecka . Frykowski later went to Paris . In 1967 he followed his friend Polański to the United States . He financed Polański's first film projects and also took part in some of his films.

At an author reading he met Abigail Folger , the young heiress of an American coffee company. Since Frykowski had little knowledge of English, but the eloquent follower could communicate with him in French, the two got closer and fell in love. Folger and Frykowski moved in the wake of Polański and his girlfriend Sharon Tate from New York to Los Angeles , where they rented a house from singer Cass Elliot from the music group The Mamas and the Papas . Fast a life in the revealed high society of Hollywood for Frykowski, said to have been, however, also involved in dubious drug deals: Presumably he was smuggling the new scene drug MDA , a precursor of the famous since the 1990s drug Ecstasy involved. Together with the married couple Tate-Polański, Frykowski and Folger often celebrated extravagant parties in the Polańskis' house on Cielo Drive in Bel Air .

The murder

On the night of August 8-9, 1969, after visiting a Mexican restaurant, Frykowski and his partner Folger and her friends, heavily pregnant Tate and hairstylist Jay Sebring , were invited to a party on the property on Cielo Drive of the Manson Family ( Susan Atkins , Charles Watson and Patricia Krenwinkel ) assaulted and brutally murdered. In addition, 18-year-old Steven Parent , who happened to be there, was shot. There are still speculations about the exact course of events. Frykowski was probably beaten with a knife in the hallway of the Polańskis' house and knocked down several times with a blunt object. According to later statements by the assassins, the victim is said to have resisted vehemently. Like his girlfriend Folger, he was able to flee to the front garden, but was struck down with 51 stab wounds.

Frykowski was cremated in Los Angeles and the urn was buried in the Stary Cmentarz (Old Cemetery) in his Polish hometown of Łódź .

Web links

• Wojciech Frykowski in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Wojciech Frykowski in the database of Find a Grave (English)
• Voyteck Frykowski at cielodrive.com (English)