His father – a lumber mill company owner before 1948 nationalization – was arrested and executed by the Communists in a show trial in 1951.
Křižan was expelled from high school for mocking the death of Czechoslovak Communist president Antonín Zápotocký.
[2] In 1981 Křižan refused the Klement Gottwald National Prize for his screenplay to the movie Signum Laudis.
In 1989 he co-wrote the petition Několik vět with Václav Havel, Stanislav Devátý and Alexander Vondra.
He was a founding member of Civic Forum and after the Velvet Revolution he worked as an adviser to the President Havel.