Alexandra Badea
On the Other Side of the World
As part of the EU project Be SpectACTive!, Romanian writer/director Alexandra Badea conducted research for her play On the Other Side of the World, including interviews with representatives of activist communities in Vienna. The result is a theatrical road trip, at the end of which the characters are empowered to act and change things, both within themselves and in the outside world. The film version of the play will now be shown in the presence of Alexandra Badea in a cooperation with the Romanian Cultural Institute in Vienna.
Having lost her boyfriend in the fire in the nightclub Colectiv, Iris, while in Vienna, gets carried away by her meeting with an enigmatic girl named Zoé. On a camper van journey through Europe, she meets special people who build new utopias when the state refuses to protect the most vulnerable. Her journey takes Iris through a transformative process, as she leaves from an autonomous space in Austria, where she has discovered the political battles of environmental activists and new ideological concepts that give rise to heated debates, to France, where she spends some time in a refugee camp and falls in love again, and later to Ireland where in a shelter for vulnerable women she helps a Romanian worker return to her home country. Facing eccentric characters and listening to their extraordinary life stories, Iris finally finds an answer to the questions floating in her head and regains the courage to give meaning to her actions.
There will be an artist talk following the film screening.
Alexandra Badea is a writer, theatre director, and filmmaker. Born in Romania, Badea has been living and working in France since 2003 and, consequently, writes in French. She’s had ten plays and one novel published with Arche Editeur and translated into several European languages. Her plays have been produced in National Theatres in France and across Europe and a few have even been adapted for the radio. Her play Pulvérisés (Pulverised) was awarded with the Grand Prix de la littérature dramatique by the Theatre National Center in France and has been mounted in France, United Kingdom, Belgium, Germany, Greece, Austria, and Switzerland. As a director she’s staged a number of performances in theatres in both France and Romania and directed two short films. Alexandra has had several residencies in Japan, Congo, Russia, Germany, Canada and been awarded several grants for writing by the Theatre National Center, the Book National Center, the Ministry of Culture, and the region Île de France. In 2022, she presented a trilogy at the Paris National Theatre La Colline. Her writing addresses current affairs and the realities of the world. Her characters are human beings, persecutors and victims of a kind of modern slavery. Understanding the zeitgeist, she gracefully links intimacy, socialism, and politics and questions the different effects of globalisation, the media, and liberalism through restrained but strong language that depicts the modernity of our world.
Credits
Written and directed by Alexandra Badea Cast Oana Brânzan, Gabriela Pîrlițeanu, Ioana Cosma, Ali Deac, Horia Fedorca, Alexandru Malaicu, Fabiola Petri, Cristina Ragos, Arina Ioana Trif, Cendana Trifan, Ștefan Tunsoiu, Iustinian Turcu, Marius Turdeanu Set design Cosmin Florea Original music Claudiu Urse Technical direction Nicușor Văcariu Sound Costin Todirenchi Lights Dorin Părău, Ioan Macrea Video Claudiu Mihăilescu Props Ana Dumitru Wardrobe Adriana Moga Director’s assistant and prompter Corina Predescu Project manager Ioana Nistorescu
A production of the Teatrul Naţional “Radu Stanca” Sibiu, realised as part of the EU project Be SpectACTive!, co-funded by the European Union’s Creative Europe programme. The screening in Vienna is kindly supported by the Romanian Cultural Institute in Vienna.
Dates & Tickets
October 2022
Admission free / Please register via ticket button / *Artist talk following the film screening
brut at Romanian Cultural Institute Vienna
Argentinierstraße 39, 1040 Vienna
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