Q&A with Oscar-Nominee Tadeusz Lysiak, Writer and Director of 'The Dress'

Beginning Friday, the Modern will start screening this year's Oscar-nominated shorts, including "The Dress." The film's writer and director chats with us as the movie gains national attention.

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It’s typical for viewers of the Academy Awards to groan over the fact they haven’t seen all of the nominees for specific categories. Even in an era when nearly every film is available via a streaming platform, the most ardent Oscar fan will still miss a few key films.

This year could be different for at least one category: short films.

Beginning this Friday, the Modern in Fort Worth is offering movie buffs the opportunity to catch all of the short films nominated at this year’s Oscars (both live action and animated). The screenings, which begin at 4 p.m., will alternate between nominees for best animated short and nominees for best live action short. The screenings will take place throughout the weekend. The full schedule appears at the bottom of this article.

While one might claim short films (normally appearing somewhere between a musical number and the In Memoriam sequence of the show) represent one of the awards’ more obscure categories, some of the films are getting a lot of global attention. Such is the case for Polish nominee, “The Dress.”

“The Dress,” written and directed by Tadeusz Lysiak, was made as a student project. “It was made to pass an exam in Warsaw Film School on a second year of study,” Lysiak told us in an exclusive interview. Yet, unlike the thousands of film school projects and theses that show up on minor film festival circuits every year, “The Dress,” Lysiak’s second short film, went from humble student short to a film that’s officially reached the pinnacle of moviedom. As an Academy Award nominee, the film will be viewed by some of the industry’s most important people and will take center stage as an A-list celebrity will belt out its title in front of millions of television viewers.

“The Dress” tells the story of Julka — brilliantly portrayed by Anna Dzieduszycka — a person of short stature who works at a motel on the border of Poland. The film poignantly portrays Julka as lonely and consistently stomaching derogatory and hurtful comments about her height. One day, a handsome trucker shows romantic interest in Julka and sets a date to see her again. Over the course of the next few days, Julka’s excitement, anxiety, self-doubt, and longing for love peek through her once stoic and rough exterior. When the trucker returns, it leads to a climax that is one of the most unsettling and heart-wrenching scenes you will see in any film this year.

In the middle of his undoubtedly busy schedule leading to the Oscars, which will take place March 27, Lysiak took a few minutes to chat with us about his phenomenal film. We discussed his road to an Academy Award nomination, whether an actor in a short film could get nominated for an Oscar (which we both agree Dzieduszycka should have), and what’s next for the up-and-coming director.

FW: Hello, is this Tad … I’m sorry, I’ve heard it pronounced a couple different ways and I don’t want to screw up your first name. Is this Mr. Lysiak?

Tadeusz Lysiak: Yeah, it’s Tadeusz [ta-de-oosh].

FW: Tadeusz.

Lysiak: Yeah, it’s too much of a Polish name, I think (laughs). Yeah.

FW: (Laughs) No, I’m just too much of an American to be able to pronounce it correctly. First, congratulations on your Oscar nomination.

Lysiak: Thank you so much. That’s very kind.

FW: So how does a film go from student project to Oscar nominee? How does this process work?

Lysiak: It’s kind of a long process, especially for short movies. It's completely different than the big ones. First, you have to be nominated for a short film festival that is signed by the Academy. So there are probably around 150 festivals around the globe like that. For example, in Poland, we have two. It's the Warsaw Film Festival and the Krakow Film Festival. And then you have to be nominated and then you have to win the main prize of that festival.

And if you win the main prize, then you get to the long list for the Oscars. So, the long list is around 150 movies, as many as the festivals. And when you are on a long list, you have to promote the movie even more to then be on the short list. And Academy members vote for movies that are on the long list to be shortlisted. So, we were voted to be on the short list. And then when you are on the short list, even more Academy members are voting, and they are voting for the nominations. So, actually, the route to achieve this is kind of a long and exhausting one.

FW: So, how did you actually find out that you were nominated?

Lysiak: We were watching it with the entire crew. We were watching it in the Polish Film Institute building in Warsaw, Poland. And you can actually see the reaction, because it was recorded. It was so emotional. You have to see it, it's on the Warsaw Film School Instagram account.

FW: I did read that the main actress (Dzieduszycka) actually helped you out a little bit with the screenplay, and I’d love for you to speak to that a little bit.

Lysiak: When I was writing the script, I already knew that I was going to approach her and ask if she would like to play in the movie. But when I was writing the first draft of the script, I didn't consult her, I did a ton of research, though, on the internet. I've watched a lot of documentaries, I've read a lot of articles about the subject. It was a couple of years of research.

And then when I finished writing the first draft, I approached Anna, and we talked about the script and she agreed to play in it. And then we talked about it, and we changed it a little. For example, I had three different endings for the movie, and I didn't know how to end the movie properly because I wanted to speak with Anna about that.

So we talked a lot and we decided to go with the ending that is actually now on the screen. So Anna had a lot of voice in that. And, of course, she gave me a ton of input with some dialogue and how to make it more real and authentic. So yeah, it was a huge collaboration between me, Anna, and other crew members.

That's probably also because this is a student project. The budget for this film is around $8,000.

FW: Oh, wow.

Lysiak: Most of the crew were working for free because we are students just trying to tell this story as well as possible. And so we all talked about how to approach different scenes and how to approach the whole movie. So, I was never a dictator, so to say. I'm not a director like that.

FW: As you know, the movie is getting a lot of attention. And with attention can come negative press. There was a recent article in Forbes that heavily criticized the ending. Of course, this was one person’s opinion [the article’s main source was filmmaker and disability advocate Ashley Eakin], and it appeared they didn’t realize you collaborated with Anna on the ending.

Lysiak: Yeah, but I'm not mad at this article. I think I agree with most of this article. I think it's very good that articles like that, and voices like that are published. And I agree with the statement that we have to make more movies that depict people with disabilities in a good way. It's a very good thing to do.

But also, when we were making this movie, we read some devastating reports, scientific reports from Human Rights Watch at University of Michigan that says that 40% of women with disabilities are sexually assaulted during their lifetime [Anna’s character, Julka, is sexually assaulted at the end of the film]. Forty percent. This is devastating. And we just wanted to make a movie about it.

I have also read that people who are victims of that kind of assault are often silent because they have no platform to speak up. And this is a huge problem. And nobody's talking about it that loud, so we really wanted to make a movie about this specific topic.

So, I understand the Forbes article and I agree with it. But we had a different message to convey.

FW: Right. By the way, I think Anna's performance was topnotch and absolutely fantastic.

Lysiak: Oh yeah. It's all about her, actually. I think she's just an acting diamond. She's one of the greatest actors that I have ever seen. So, it was such a pleasure to work with her and see how she was evolving on the set. I think she should have been nominated for best actress also, absolutely.

FW: Yeah, I actually thought about that myself. I was wondering, watching this short film, has anyone ever been nominated for a short film for best actress? Because she was that good in it.

Lysiak: Yeah, I think no. And I think Anna would be a perfect example of someone who could break that mold.

FW: Why do you think it's important for people to see this movie? It's going to be showing here at the Modern this weekend. Why should people in Fort Worth go and watch it?

Lysiak: I think this is a really important movie. I'm really sincere about that. Because it speaks to a subject that is not often talked about. It shows, as I said before, a horrifying thing that is happening to women with all sorts of disabilities in the world.

I would say it also has authentic casting, and Anna's performance is great. And I think the cinematography is great. And this is a film that matters. It also touches a lot of different topics beyond women of short stature. It's also about women, women's friendship, women's solidarity. It's about women's power. This is all very important to me and Anna. It talks a little about men and how they are often pigs. And we have to fight against that.

FW: Obviously, Anna's performance is getting a lot of praise. But what's getting an equal amount of praise is the filmmaking itself. Would love for you to speak to the look and feel of this film.

Lysiak: I'm really glad that I was working with Konrad Bloch, my cinematographer, who's also my oldest friend. I think he's incredibly important to this movie. We talked a lot about how to approach this movie because we didn't want it to be too straightforward or too over the top in terms of visuals. We wanted it to feel like a documentary.

We used a lot of natural lighting, we used handheld; we didn’t have too much equipment so we could give Anna freedom. My cinematographer didn't want to surround her with too much lighting equipment and so on and so on. This allowed her to stand if she wanted to stand or sit down if she wanted to sit down during a scene.

So there were a lot of improvised moments in this movie because we wanted it to feel like a very universal story. Of course it talks about the specific subject, the social issue, for example. But we also wanted everyone to identify with Julka and her emotions. We wanted people to see Julka in themselves.

FW: What's next for you?

Lysiak: I'm actually working on my full feature this year, that's an obvious next step for every young filmmaker after he or she makes his or her short. I just finished my first draft of the script, and it's going to be a psychological thriller. The working title is “Obsession,” and it's about a young couple whose child goes missing.

And the main protagonist, the husband, is seeing more and more evidence that his wife committed the murder. But you don't know if he is on the right track, or is he depressed and starting to go crazy because of the missing child. So, you as a viewer are always questioning what’s true.

FW: Do you ultimately have dreams of going to Los Angeles and Hollywood and being that kind of director?

Lysiak: Absolutely, yes. This is my ultimate goal. But not because I'm a snob or something, but because I really think that movies in Hollywood are being recognized all around the globe and a lot of people see them. There are a lot of viewers because they are in English, and it's absolutely understandable to me that not many people see Polish movies around the globe, because nobody knows Polish and everybody, not everybody, but most of the world knows English. So, I really would like to make movies in English to have a much broader audience.

You can watch "The Dress" along with the other nominated short films this weekend at the Modern in Fort Worth.

Schedule:

Friday

4 p.m. Animated, 8 p.m. Live Action

Saturday

5 p.m. Animated

Sunday 

Noon Animated, 2 p.m. Live Action, 4 p.m. Animated