ReActing as a Star is coming to beautiful Bled

The second edition of the international ReActing as a Star programme, dedicated to encouraging networking among regional actors and European casting directors, film directors, and other audiovisual professionals and increasing their mobility and presence in the European film industry, will take place from 15 to 17 June in Bled, Slovenia. This year’s edition, designed as a networking event where actors can find new business opportunities, enhance their competencies, broaden their knowledge, and live by the motto "Play Locally, Act Internationally!", will be attended by 19 talented and renowned actors from the region. The ReActing as a Star programme holds the European Film Academy’s Knowledge Sharing label for its 2023 and 2024 editions. Under the Knowledge Sharing label, the European Film Academy seeks to support outstanding projects aimed at connecting people keen to share with those willing to listen and learn.

The ReActing as a Star programme is an initiative of the Slovenian Film Centre and Secret Arts Cinema, which produce the event in cooperation with the film funds and centres from Croatia, Serbia, North Macedonia, and Montenegro, as well as the Sarajevo Film Festival’s CineLink Industry Days Training and Skills programme, European Film Academy, International Casting Directors Network, and Filmmakers.eu platform. On this occasion, Nataša Bučar, the director of the Slovenian Film Centre, stated the following:

“I am glad we have created the ReActing as a Star programme, which brings many accomplished and renowned film actors from the region as well as well-established casting directors and talent agents to Slovenia. Together with the regional film centres, we support this project with the common ambition of ensuring a greater presence of our actors in film productions and thus providing them with more opportunities for recognition within the region and abroad. With the ReActing as a Star programme, Slovenia is getting an internationally recognised event that is vital both for the Slovenian film industry and the region, where our filmmakers cooperate and coproduce their works”.

The group of well-known and experienced actresses and actors will include Nika Rozman and Blaž Setnikar from Slovenia; Borka Tomović and Radovan Vujović from Serbia; Tihana Ćulafić and Petar Burić from Montenegro; Iva Mihalić and Slavko Sobin from Croatia; Amila Terzimehić and Boris Ler from Bosnia and Herzegovina; and Natasha Petrovic and Dimitar Gjorgjievski from North Macedonia. Additionally, seven young regional actors and actresses from the Talents Sarajevo actors studio – Anita Ognjanović, Anuša Kodelja, Luna Pilić, Mira Janjetović, Marija Labudović, Nebojša Rako andDino Bajrović– will also join the programme.

On the occasion of the programme’s second edition, Tina Hajon from Secret Arts Cinema, the author of the ReActing project and the director of the programme, said the following:

“We are honoured that our regional and European colleagues have recognised the importance of this project and delighted to announce that ReActing as a Star holds the European Film Academy’s Knowledge Sharing label as an outstanding European training programme. This year, we will host a great selection of our regional actresses and actors and give them the opportunity to meet renowned regional film directors and work with the greatest casting directors such as Cassandra Han and Jeremy Zimmerman. ReActing as a Star will once again be an important meeting point where actors have time to meet each other and openly discuss topics that are important for them.”

The second edition of ReActing as a Star will open on 15 June with a special programme titled ‘In conversation with Branka Katić, a master class moderated by Nataša Bučar, the director of the Slovenian Film Centre. Branka Katić is one of the few actors from our region who has enjoyed both domestic and international success and worked extensively in theatre, TV, and film. She has collaborated with renowned directors such as Peter Kosminsky, Michael Radford, Anthony Minghella, Michael Mann and Sally Potter. She has shared the screen with notable actors such as Javier Bardem, Johnny Depp, Christian Bale, Tim Spall, Romain Duris, Jason Schwartzman and Sarah Lancashire. The Masterclass and the round tables – as well as the ReActing Presentation, planned for 16 June, where the selected attending actors will present their portfolios to the regional media – will be open to the public.

Two round tables with renowned guests will be held on 16 June. The first one, dedicated to the topic of talent agents and casting directors, will be moderated by Timka Grin, President of the International Casting Directors Network (ICDN) and an experienced casting director who has worked with filmmakers such as the Dardenne brothers, Jean-Luc Godard, Danis Tanovic, Aida Begic, Jasmila Žbanić and many others. The participants of the second roundtable, moderated by the film scholar Nebojša Jovanović, will include the renowned film directors Tubravka Turić from Croatia, Damjan Kozole from Slovenia and Srdan Golubović from Serbia.

The international programme in Bled will also include two workshops, taking place on 17 June, by the following casting directors: Cassandra Han, who specialises in crossing over between the German, Italian, UK, and US markets and is known for her work on James Mangold’s Academy-Award-winning Ford VS Ferrari, Terrence Malick’s A Hidden Life, Oskar Roehler’s Eight and a Quarter, etc.); and Jeremy Zimmerman, one of the UK’s leading casting directors, who has worked with notable directors such as Todd Field, Ron Howard, Guillermo del Toro, Bille August, Giuseppe Tornatore, Isabel Coixet, Peter Yates, John Schlesinger, Ridley Scott, Bruce Beresford, Neil Marshall, and Sir Richard Attenborough. His filmography includes features like Moon, In Love And War, Swing Kids, Willow, Robin Hood Prince Of Thieves, Blade Ii, Africa United, Hidalgo, Keeping Mum, Hellboy and most recently, the Academy-Award-nominated Tár.

As a reminder, the international programme ReActing as a Star was launched in 2022 as a networking event and has already presented twenty regional actors to the casting directors and agents. Last year’s rich and fruitful edition included master classes and workshops by the director Teona Mitevska, actors Leon Lučev and Jelena Graovac Lučev and Luc Besson’s casting director Nathalie Chéron. Additionally, the Croatian director Dalibor Matanić, Yngvill Kolset Haga (the casting director of Joachim Trier’s The Worst Person in the World), and Ita O’Brien (a movement director and intimacy coordinator for film, TV, and theatre) were part of the event’s line-up. After the successful organisation of the first international programme dedicated entirely to the actors from the region, in August 2022, the directors of film centres from Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, North Macedonia and Montenegro signed a three-year Memorandum of Cooperation on the ReActing as a Star project for the first time.

Source: Slovenian Film Centre