TOO Episode 140- The Directors Lab Mediterranean Conversations, Part 2. Paolo Costantini, Maria Varnakkidou, and Marta Mari

In this episode, Adam speaks with directors Paolo Costantini, Maria Varnakkidou, and Marta Mari.

Berlin-based Italian director Paolo Costantini is a graduate of the Silvio d'Amico National Dramatic Academy. He joined the Interkulturelles Theaterzentrum, a Fabulamundi partner, in Berlin, before collaborating with Italian-German company Barletti/Waas. He is a trusted Assistant Director to Antonio Latella whose current production of Hamlet won the Ubu Award for best show of the year. In 2021, Paolo won the Venice Biennale Teatro's Under 30 Directors competition with the project "Uno Sguardo Estraneo",  still touring across Italy today. He was recently selected for a project “Il Fondo” led by the Santarcangelo Festival, supporting non-conventional artistic research.

Maria Varnakkidou is a Cypriot theatre director who studied at Brunel University and completed her master’s degree in Theatre Directing at Royal Holloway University in the UK. She has worked in the theatre and film world for the past ten years across various projects. Her interests include devised, immersive, and community theatre, creating work for social change and critical thinking.  She was a creative director of the Buffer Fringe Festival 2020-21, and this year she is one of the artistic curators. 

Edinburgh-based Polish director Marta Mari, is a graduate of Columbia College Chicago, & has an MA in Arts and Cultural Management from Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh.  Marta is a director, producer, & teacher and was an artistic director of Asylon Theatre for 9 years creating new writing, site-specific, devised as well as classic works. Her work as a director for young audiences and as a producer and arts manager has been presented at Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Edinburgh International Science Festival, Puppet Animation Festival, Edinburgh Mela Festival, and Universal Arts.

Mentioned in this episode-

Hamlet
Antonioni
Tarkovsky