Adrien Brody pays his dues in 'The Pianist' / Actor starved himself to 130 pounds for role as Nazi victim in Polanski film

Adrien Brody took his part in "The Pianist'' very seriously: "Playing a real person, you have the obligation to do it the right way.'' Adrien Brody took his part in "The Pianist'' very seriously: "Playing a real person, you have the obligation to do it the right way.'' Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close Adrien Brody pays his dues in 'The Pianist' / Actor starved himself to 130 pounds for role as Nazi victim in Polanski film 1 / 3 Back to Gallery

Playing a Polish Jew in hiding from the Nazis, Adrien Brody spends most of "The Pianist" alone onscreen, imparting great emotional and physical devastation without the benefit of getting to play off other actors or even getting to speak.

"It was kind of a blessing, what an actor hopes for -- to have that kind of focus from the director on the character's journey," Brody, a Golden Globe nominee for best actor, said of his many solo scenes in the movie. "You're so immersed in it because there's no time to come up for air. It gave me a tremendous amount of discipline as an actor and gave me tremendous insight into the filmmaking process."

The insight was more than technical because his director was Roman Polanski.

"The Pianist," which opens Friday, tells the true story of Wladyslaw Szpilman,

a pianist for Polish radio who outwitted the Nazis and later wrote a memoir about it. But the harrowing and starkly beautiful film -- up for a Golden Globe for best drama -- also reflects the childhood experiences of Polanski, who lived in the Krakow ghetto and whose mother died in a concentration camp.

"I had Roman there to really provide me with guidance," Brody said during a visit to San Francisco. "(Polanski) had experienced more than his share of loss in life, and yet he has this tremendous power to overcome that and thrive,

and he has a wonderful enthusiastic quality most people lack. Watching him, I saw a kind of window into what (Szpilman) must have been like."

Polanski, whose personal tragedies mounted when his pregnant wife, actress Sharon Tate, was killed by the Manson Family in 1969, has said "The Pianist" is Szpilman's story, not his own. But the director "incorporated a lot of things that have really affected him profoundly" into the movie, Brody said. Like a scene where a Nazi officer on the street smacks Szpilman's father, which wasn't in the book.

"That happened to Roman's father, and he remembered his father coming home to tell him that," Brody said.

Brody, 29, a tall, lean and thoughtful actor probably best known as the punk rocker in Spike Lee's 1999 film "Summer of Sam," got the "Pianist" role partly because of proximity. Polanski was casting the film in Paris, where he has lived since fleeing the United States and possible jail time in 1977 for having sex with a 13-year-old girl. Brody had been in Europe to make 2000's "Harrison's Flowers," and Polanski hired him after seeing a Paris screening of that film, in which Brody played a war photographer.

During the eight months he spent preparing for and shooting "The Pianist" in Europe -- "I gave up my New York apartment, sold my car and turned off my cell phone" -- Brody bonded with Polanski, becoming privy to personal details others on the set didn't know.

"I tried to get as much information as I could from (Polanski), but he didn't want to talk," said German actor Thomas Kretschmann, who plays a small but pivotal role as a Nazi officer. Later, when Kretschmann watched the film with Polanski, "he said, 'That happened to me,' and 'this happened to me' -- the whole film is full of his experiences."

Brody said he felt the weight of wanting to do justice to Polanski's memories, and to those of Szpilman, who died in 2000 at 88.

"He survived this and made (his experiences) available to the world," Brody said. "Playing a real person, you have the obligation to do it the right way."

That entailed a physical transformation. To approximate Szpilman's appearance years into his captivity -- after he has survived the Warsaw ghetto,

eluded the train to Treblinka and subsisted on the odd food basket from resistance fighters -- the 6-foot-1 Brody got down to 130 pounds.

"It was excruciating," Brody said. "I was extremely weak, and I mentioned it to Roman, and it was kind of what he wanted, you know? He wanted it to be truthful."

The quest for authenticity also led Brody to intensive piano lessons. The New York native, who had studied piano as a child, polished his Chopin so well that his playing made it into the film in spots. The music helped Brody understand how Szpilman got through his ordeal.

"During the time I was starving myself, the thing I was most comforted by was playing the music," Brody said. "It calmed me and allowed me to some degree to distract myself from my own loneliness at that time."

Because Polanski cannot come to the United States, Brody has assumed the added responsibility of speaking on behalf of the film. That task, Brody says, has strengthened his ties to the film and to Polanski, whose artistry has yet to eclipse his notoriety.

"I think people should kind of get over it," Brody said of the director's trouble with the law. "The guy's 69, he's got a family and he's a phenomenal filmmaker."

Brody's performance in "The Pianist" should dispel his own slight notoriety,

as the guy who got cut out of 1998's "The Thin Red Line." The war film was supposed to be his big break, before mercurial director Terrence Malick reduced his starring role to a cameo.

"That has the potential to really harm an actor's career because people think it must have been your fault, not that the director changed his vision," Brody said. "It's something you'd rather have happen early in your career rather than later."

"The Pianist" has given Brody his real breakthrough while still in his 20s, in a role of such rare complexity that it has spoiled him for other parts, at least temporarily.

"After this," he said, "I can't just jump into something that doesn't touch me significantly."

'The Pianist'

The movie opens Friday at Bay Area theaters.