EXCLUSIVE: Netflix has promoted Łukasz Kłuskiewicz to run TV and movies in the Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) region.
Kłuskiewicz is currently head of the CEE film and licensing team but will now oversee series and film production, licensing, and the non-fiction slate across CEE.
The move represents the first time an executive has been in charge of all CEE content and Kłuskiewicz will now operate similarly to the likes of Anne Mensah in the UK or Italy’s Tinny Andreatta. We are told Netflix’s CEE focus remains on Polish original movies and series while licensing local titles to the likes of Czechia, Romania and Hungary.
Kłuskiewicz has been promoted in a growing team, which has also hired Marta Grela (series), Daria Drzewiecka (film) and Tomasz Blachnicki (film) over the past year or so.
Netflix launched in Poland in 2016, expanded into other CEE countries three years later and opened a Warsaw hub in 2022. Since joining in 2018, Kłuskiewicz’s credits have included Forgotten Love, Justice, the 365 Days trilogy and How I Fell in Love with a Gangster. He is a 15-year industry vet who used to work for Polish pubcaster TVP and Nat Geo.
Other CEE originals include High Water and 1983. Later this year, the streamer will launch Heweliusz, its “largest local original production in terms of scale to date,” which is a limited series inspired by the sinking of the Polish passenger ferry on the Baltic Sea in 1993. Netflix has also adapted three Harlan Coben books into Polish series – most recently, Just One Look.
The CEE region has also been making moves in the formats biz, with Polish versions of Rhythm + Flow and Love is Blind.
