Gene Gutowski, Polish-born American film producer, Died at 90

  Actor

Gene Gutowski, born as Witold Bardach was born on July 26, 1925, in Lwów, Poland, now Ukraine, and died on May 10, 2016, in Warsaw.

He was a Polish-American film producer.

Gene produced many of Roman Polanski’s films.

He was associated with some of the great films of the 20th Century: the Oscar-winning “The Pianist” and films like “Repulsion”, “Cul-de-Sac” and “The Fearless Vampire Killers”.

Even though he was a producer of numerous films, he is best known for his successful collaboration with longtime friend and fellow Pole, Roman Polanski.

Following a short time as a fashion illustrator, Gene Gutowski became a TV and film producer with a few low budget productions to his name, including the TV series I Spy.

Gene relocated to London in 1960 to produce Station Six Sahara.

There, he joined forces with Roman Polanski in 1963.

Which prove to be a fruitful creative partnership they made Repulsion (1965), Cul-De-Sac (1966) and The Fearless Vampire Killers (1967), until Polanski moved to Hollywood under contract to Paramount in 1967.

During 1970, he wrote the script for and produced The Adventures of Gerard, directed by Jerzy Skolimowski, and then produced A Day at the Beach (1970) and Romance of a Horsethief (1971).

The duo remained friends, Gutowski and Polanski joined forces again to produce together The Pianist (2002), a multiple Oscar winning film.

Gene Gutowski has also staged several plays, including Passion Flower Hotel (1965), Death and the Maiden (1992) and Doubt: A Parable (2007).

During 2004, Gene Gutowski published his Polish autobiography “Od Holocaustu do Hollywood” (From Holocaust to Hollywood), of which an English-language edition “With Balls and Chutzpah: A Story of Survival” was published in the U.S. in 2011.

Gene Gutowski passed away at 90 yrs old.