“Love will forgive you everything” – sang Maria Anna Pietruszyńska, better known under her stage name Hanka Ordonówna. She began her acting career in the year Poland regained independence. She performed in theater, cabaret and film. She was not only a talented actress and singer, but also a charismatic woman who willingly – against the prevailing fashion – donned pants and low-cut dresses. Also, famous poets wrote texts for her, for example, Julian Tuwim, Marian Hemar, Konstanty Ildefons Gałczyński, or Jan Lechoń.
She began her career at the age of 16 in a Warsaw cabaret named Sfinks and then the theater Wesoły Ul in Lublin under the stage name Anna Ordon singing hits still popular today: “O mój rozmarynie”, “Rozkwitały pęki białych róż”, and “Ułani, ułani”.
When this cabaret closed, Hanka Ordonówna moved to Warsaw and worked at the cabaret Miraż, where she was spoted by Fryderyk Jarosy, director of the Warsaw cabaret Qui Pro Quo; it was under his guidance that she became a star, recording “Miłość ci wszystko wybaczy” (song by Henryk Wars and Julian Tuwim) in the 1933 movie Szpieg w masce (A Masked Spy). Another hit was Marian Hemar’s Jakieś małe nic (“Some Little Nothing”), 1934.
Actress and singer Hanka Ordonówna was a big star in prewar Poland, as big as they come.
In occupied Poland she was persecuted by the Germans, in occupied Lithuania by the Soviets.
She still found the strength to rescue Polish kids in the USSR.
She died in Beirut #OTD in 1950. pic.twitter.com/poc1jA4MT5
— Institute of National Remembrance (@ipngovpl_eng) September 8, 2022