Read article on Max Kolonko in Leicesterview
Mariusz Max Kolonko, New York. A household name with Poles around the world gives an exclusive interview to Joanna Gulbińska for Opinia and Leicesterview. Max is an outstanding journalist and broadcaster whose experiences include reporting from the army base in Guantanamo, NASA Space Centre in Florida, the Greenbrier nuclear bunker and the White House. Max Kolonko is a graduated Master in journalism from Warsaw University and Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan. The owner and founder of Media 2000 Communications since 1993. Producer and Director of popular, European TV series Discovering America with Max Kolonko. A member since 1992 of the Foreign Press Centre of the U.S. Department of State, New York Press, Foreign Press Association, FPC New York and The Freelancers Union.Max Kolonko is the first Polish journalist and one of the few American journalists to report from the inside of the heart of the U.S. Missile Defense at Fort Greeley, Alaska in March 2007. He is a one of the few American journalists to report from the inside of NORAD, the into the centre of the U.S. air defense dug into the Cheyenne Mountains and the only television journalist who had his hands on nuclear buttons at FE Warren AFB. Max is the only reporter so far to cast an Oscar at the Chicago Oscar factory (for film director Andrzej Wajda awarded Life Achievement Award!). In 1988 Max played chess with IBM supercomputer Deep Blue, the same computer that Kasparov had lost with. He lost playing white after 32 moves. These are just a few of the achievements accomplished by the amazing Mariusz Max Kolonko…
Why did you decide to study for your Masters in journalism?MMK: When you’re in communist Poland you can express your opinion about the system by either writing anti-propaganda graffiti on walls or by being a conscious journalist. I was both. With my classmate Radek Sikorski (former Minister of the Defense) we organized school strikes in Poland. Then I decided I’ll go to study the media business.
How did you come to be hosting two National Radio programmes in the 1980’s while still at college?MMK: I was good. (laughter) My life then was radio and television. I didn’t go to disco clubs, didn’t date (too much) or study too hard (smile). I was living at the radio station which was a great thing to do since I didn’t have a room at the dormitory. I remember how one day a cleaning woman woke me up with her Hoover from under a studio desk. I was scared more than she was. I regained composure, the lamp: ON AIR went off and I said: “This is Polish Radio Channel Three… It’s six am. Good morning Poland…”.What inspired you to leave Poland and go to America in 1988?MMK: It was to be a month’s stay which somehow lasted almost 20 years now. I think America was in my blood since childhood. I spoke English at home and my parents were going crazy when, as a 10 year old, I was saying: “damn!” instead of: “ojej!” That intensified in high school, I read everything from Mark Twain to Joyce. One day someone brought a new single to my program to play it on air: it was Bruce Springsteen’s Dancing in The Dark with this incredible line: “There’s something happening somewhere, I just know that there is”… and that was it. I packed and Poland ended that day for me.
How different was the reality of moving to New York compared to your expectations? MMK: It was like meeting your dream girl and fall in love from the start. I loved America and America showed me her charms, teased me but didn’t kick me in the ass. I strongly believe that life rewards you when you respect it’s ways. In this case I respected and cherished America as a phenomenon unaccounted for anywhere else; it’s brief but heroic history, incredible, unprecedented collision of vast open spaces with modern civilization which Miłosz admired so much, it’s culture of openness and reward for man’s entrepreneurship. These were things I didn’t find in Poland. When you read my book Discovering America (now on Amazon) you see that one of the biggest regrets to Poland that I have is that its people cannot bring you in when you stand out, they expel you instead, ostracize you as an odd thing, unfit to a group that in its mass adores equality and conformity. Just look: who emigrates historically from Poland? The working class in what’s called economic immigration and intellectuals, personalities, what I call “intellectual immigration”. And that’s the group I belong to.
Having spent years building a successful construction company and renovating skyscrapers what made you decide to come back into TV journalism?MMK: Oh, to this day I look at “my” Manhattan skyscrapers with proud but television is in my blood. The “construction” episode in my life lasted just a few years and was my way of getting the means to break into television business, especially as I arrived at JFK with $200 I borrowed. Funny but I borrowed this money from my colleague from the radio who is now one of the richest man in Poland. When we meet in NY we always crack up on these old days.
How do you cope with the challenges of working in today’s world of instant news and converged media?MMK: Today’s media business gives you opportunities you didn’t have years ago. Today you can get a decent TV camera for under 5,000 US dollars and become a “film director”. The name of the game is distribution. But here again the internet offers new opportunities and you have to be there in order to stay on top. Look at Polish TV personalities and their websites…not much action there. I for one have my own internet audience on MaxTV (www.thanku.com) where you can find my television programs broadcast every day. You got www.maxkolonko.com where you can see more news and projects, you have some fan club site at www.MaxTVnews.com which, to my surprise, is run by my producer Yvette Williams and then I’ve just launched www.Max-Films.com where you have my movies played in entirety once a week. Some of these movies reached 200 thousand views mark which equals to average audience of TV4, a commercial television station in Poland and these numbers are growing.
You have achieved many firsts in journalism and won numerous prestigious awards. What is your proudest achievement?MMK: My proudest achievement is always an email or letter or a word of praise form John Doe, an average person living in average town who somehow through my stories found something meaningful for himself in my reporting, something that makes his world and his or hers life better. It can be some information but also: emotion. I’m proud to introduce a television essay to Polish TV, form that was not present in the news programming there before. It came to me after 9/11 tragedy when I found myself at a point in which as a reporter, I couldn’t say more, better describe the horrors I’ve seen. So I spoke through images and emotions typical of that unique but difficult form of TV making. Some of these essays you can find in archive section of my www.maxkolonko.com website to get an understanding on what I’m saying.
How do you account for your popularity?MMK: Popularity doesn’t interest me as a phenomenon and I do not devote my time to its ways. I’m always surprised when I talk to a stranger at a store and he or she speaks back to me in my first name. It helps to buy good kielbasa perhaps but in a long run can I find it annoying and unwanted. I live in America in a small, quiet town known for its low profile, high security fences and attention to privacy. My neighbor is a TV anchor from ABC, another is the brother of Stevie Wonder, few houses down there’s model Brooke Shields. I’m a new kid on the block there but lately local cops stopped me; in our local town library they got hold of a Gala interview with me on the cover. Thank God they couldn’t read it. (laughter)
How important are your Polish roots?MMK: Man without his roots is like a tree without leaves. I’m happy to have my space in Poland but also, you have to understand, it’s hard to be Polish in America. I want to be clear what I say: we, Polish people, have made a lot of effort for this world not to like us. I like about it in my book: our messianism, ethnocentrism, lack of tolerance, jealousy, lack of ability to compromise – these are features of our society that I find embarrassing and which are uncommon in modern societies. In Poland, envy I meet all the time. Poles can be envy of your house, girlfriend, success, money, a car, a dog, anything. Then we go to church and ask God for forgiveness. Then we come back and love sit at a computer desk and under some anonymous nickname we slander anybody for anything. That Poland I’m not proud of at all.
It is never easy to start from scratch but do you think it was easer to start in 1988 or these days in America?MMK: Of course. After I came to America I made $60 a day standing on a ladder. That versus $20 a month I made hosting national radio program. Today it’s tip money. Economical immigration is over. It will take time however for people to understand that, since as people we think the grass is always greener on your neighbour’s lawn.
There has been a new wave of emigration recently, especially to England and other European countries which allow people to work freely and legally. What advice would you have to young Poles thinking of working abroad?MMK: First: Read my book Discovering America. Chapter: Polish Syndrome Reprise. It’s all there. Why we don’t succeed where others do? What’s American Thinking? What’s Homo Sovieticus and why should you be afraid of it? Second: Immigration created its own myths. Immigration mythology is very appealing to an average Kowalski. It’s covered by waves of immigrants who promote immigration mythology of success and myths of America as of a country where you can’t be unsuccessful. They write letters home full of success stories, what they did and what they will accomplish, often come to Poland with 5 grand in their pockets to symbolize how well off they are. Often the fact is that they didn’t accomplish anything meaningful, and the money they have is the ONLY money they got. Often they are rejected by American middle class cause they speak Polish all the time and lock themselves in a Polish ghetto which is a good thing when you want to parade on Pulaski Day down 5th Avenue but has disastrous consequences to their carriers in mainstream America in everyday life.
Any examples?MMK: I remember I went out on a date with a Miss Polonia who was two years in America and she kept speaking Polish. I said: „Do you mind we speak English?” Knowing she can speak English quite well. Her reaction was typically Polish: „Why? Are you ashamed to be Polish?” I took a breath and said: “Yes. In this case: Yes. I am and I tell you why: I spent 20 years of my life working my ass off in America to become like all these people around us who take America as birth place for granted. I paid taxes like they all, I wanted to join the army like they all do, I wanted to make money like they all do and be happy like they all do. I worked hard, fought my way through, from standing on a ladder for 6 bucks an hour to being the owner of two successful companies. Finally I became the U.S. citizen and I can enjoy this great nation and its privileges. I’ve got a big house and drive 100 thousand dollars wheels and more than that I cherish my life as American in the country which made me a man, tough, conscious man who knows his place in the world and his obligation to the society, nation and God. And after all I’ve been through I didn’t come here to yapp in Polish with some pretty Polish woman who’s got her patriotism upside down.” That’s it. Of course that was my only date with that girl. Which is probably – when you come to look at it – not a bad thing after all.
Thank you for a fascinating interview and best wishes from Opinia and Leicesterview for continued success in all that you do – Joanna Gulbinska.
