- Mr Krejcik made over 20 films in a career that began in 1947. His best known films include the 1960 WWII drama Higher Principle, the biographical film about the singer Ema Destinova entitled The Divine Ema, as well as a number of comedies.
Jirí Krejcík received the Czech Lion film award for lifetime achievement, as well as a similar prize from the Karlovy Vary film festival. He was also awarded the Czech Republic's Medal of Merit in recognition of his work.- IMDb Mini Biography By: Radio Prague
- He was originally considered as director of Jako jed (1986), eventually directed by Vít Olmer.
- He was originally considered as director of Horoucí srdce (1963), eventually directed by Otakar Vávra.
- His name is pronounced "Yih-rzhee Khrey-cheek".
- [on why he was removed from directing The Emperor and the Golem (1952)]: "We started filming at a time when Jan Werich was performing daily at the Karlín Theatre in 'The Finnian's Rainbow'. An actor who has such a busy schedule has such a rhythm that when he returns home after a performance, he naturally can't fall asleep right away and falls asleep long after midnight. But we started filming at nine o'clock, which meant waking Werich up at half past five so he could be in the make-up room at six. By nine Werich was on the set, masked but internally asleep. We started shooting and Werich said, 'Listen, Krejcik, isn't this stupid?' 'What do you suggest, Mr Werich?' He patted me on the shoulder and said, 'Think it over,' and went into the dressing room to snore. In the afternoon he came back to life, we shot the footage, but still half the day was lost. And the plan started to go awry. The second negative influence Werich's daily theatrical appearances had on our film was in the form of Werich's speech. He was used to broad gestures from the theatre, but for the film you need a more subtle expression. I tried to subdue Werich, but he was worried if I would drag him into civilism, he wouldn't be funny. At this stage of our communication, during the scene of Rudolf taking a bath, he cut his leg, and that was the end of it. I was removed from the film and Martin Fric, who was known to be able to get along with Werich as he already directed him several times, got it after me."
- [on Magda Vásáryová]: "Recently, Mrs. Vásáryová told in TV that I once started choke her during filming. And nobody thought to ask: 'But, for God's sake, why?!' I remember that during the filming of Hry lásky sálivé (1971), Mrs. Vásáryová suddenly shouted that all the Czechs should be hanged. The lighting crew immediately switched off the spotlights and the DOP stopped filming, saying: 'Not another meter with this lady!' But I was two days away from filming, so I ran to them and said: 'She's just a stupid girl, she didn't mean it...' So Mrs.Vásáryová apologized that they shouldn't hang all the Czechs, that they should hang only Krejcik and a costume designer Theodor Pistek, and the filming continued. Well, imagine if I had said in Bratislava at Koliba Studios that all Slovaks should be hanged! I'll never go home again!"
- [on Bozská Ema (1979)]: "After I hadn't made a film for seven years, I was sitting in the waiting room of the central director (of the Barrandov Studios) Jirí Purs, that slanderer of Czech culture, and when I was invited in, Zdenek Mahler, who was in a similar situation, was already sitting there. Purs, tired of our insistence and the intercessions of our supporters, pushed Mahler's script for 'The Divine Emma' into my hand, which had come into his hand a moment before: "So make this!" The musical genius Zdenek Liska got into our realization trio so that the film was already finished, the post-synchrons were already being shot and one famous composer refused me. Liska took a look at it and in a few days he was done. He conceived the music as variations on the famous arias that Destinn sang."
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