Vanessa Van Durme
b. 1948, Ghent, Belgium
Vanessa Van Durme studied drama and theatre at the Conservatory in Ghent. Vanessa‟s career starts on the scene of the Nederlands Toneel Gent, now known as the NTGent. She made the difficult but inevitable decision to undergo a sex change and as a result left the company and gave up a career in theatre.
Twenty years later she picked up the thread once more and devoted herself to writing comedies.
She wrote dozens of television screenplays for various broadcasting companies, including the complete sitcom series Liefde en Geluk for the VRT national channel, and was responsible for directing the actors. She was a popular radio personality for five years and had the longest run-ning comedy act on Belgian radio. She has written about twenty plays for the stage.
Her breakthrough in theatre came when the Belgian choreographer and theatre-maker Alain Platel cast her in the role of the mother Tosca in Allemaal Indiaan. After touring for two years with this production she moved to the Victoria theatre company in Ghent to act in White Star, which was based on an idea of hers. She then toured Europe for two years with this production.
She wrote her book, Look mummy, I’m dancing, and from it distilled the monologue of the same name, which she will perform in four languages all over Europe and America. In her monologue, in which she speaks openly about her sex change, she hoped to remove public prejudice and show that people who are „slightly different‟ are also … people.
Tolerance and accepting someone who is „different‟ are important items on Vanessa‟s agenda. Her latest production Femme Blanche, is set in colonial Morocco in the last century. Her aim in this piece is to spotlight today‟s rapidly growing racism, intolerance and the „Banlieu hazard‟.
Griet Debacker
°1964, Roeselare, Belgium
After obtaining a degree in speech therapy (1985) and a First Prize in Drama (1989) at the Ghent Conservatory, Griet worked as a freelance actress with numerous Belgian and Dutch theatre companies. She played in a number of sitcoms for the Belgian public television broadcasting company VRT and made several guest appearances in Flemish fiction series.
In 2005 she founded the Swan Lake company together with Vanessa Van Durme and produced Kijk mama, ik dans (Look mummy, I’m dancing) under the direction of Frank Van Laecke. Since then, she coached Vanessa during the world tour of this production. Their second production, Femme Blanche, saw its première performance in November 2009. It was directed by Jan Steen.
Andrea De Laet
° 1952, Niel, Belgium
When she was small, Andrea De Laet had two dreams: to become a nursery school teacher or study at the Antwerp Academy of Dramatic Art. At that time, the first dream was reserved only for girls and the second dream found little support from home. Andrea took a job, but in her spare time she kept hammering away at her dreams. She took evening courses in foreign languages and typewriting and went to a school for dramatic arts in Boom on Saturday afternoons. Afterwards, she spent four years taking classes in protest culture at the Internationale Nieuwe Scène, a Belgian theatre company. She co-founded the Pichak Teater in Niel in the late seventies. Andrea continued on her path and played the part of a transvestite for a dozen years in a production hosted by a theatrical restaurant in Antwerp. Being on stage in Gardenia is like a dream come true.
Richard „Tootsie‟ Dierick
° 1952, Lokeren, Belgium
„A dream comes true‟. After a delightful and warm childhood, Richard completed secondary education at a school where classical humanities (Latin and Greek) were part of his curriculum in 1970. He sought something that reflected his commitment to society and enrolled in a paedi-atric nursing programme. After graduation in 1973 he was able to start working as a nurse at the Queen Paola Children‟s Hospital in Antwerp. During three wonderful years of study Richard, who was a late bloomer, experienced an identity crisis and came to understand that he was ho-mosexual. He soon made peace with this and is still gay today.
To counter the heavy workload presented by his job, Richard found an escape in the world of entertainment. He took classes in declamation for six years and spent three years at a school for dramatic arts and took jazz dance, African dance and tap dance classes. His irregular working hours made it difficult to join a theatrical company. Finally, Richard ended up in the fantastic world of transvestite theatre. He was on stage for thirty years and enjoyed giving voice to the theatrical animal hidden within his innermost being. He is pleased to contribute his experience and talent to Gardenia: the icing on his cake.
Danilo Povolo
° 1954, Vaux-Sous-Chevremont, Belgium
Danilo Povolo grew up in the Walloon Provinces and took courses in the Dutch language. When he completed his secondary education he worked as a white-collar worker in Brussels, Liege and Antwerp. Danilo has travelled across the globe in his spare time with the Mama Roma Show, a transvestite theatre company, since 1978. They made frequent guest appearances throughout Europe and all over the world (even as far as Guadeloupe). In 1995 Danilo left the theatre company and moved to Antwerp. This is where he joined Cabaret Follies, a comic trans-vestite theatre company that tours Belgium. Danilo also enjoys theatre and cinema.
Gerrit Becker
° 1944, Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Gerrit Becker was trained as a furniture upholsterer in Antwerp and subsequently took a number of computer courses. A versatile man, his activities extend into many fields: he worked in the catering industry, as a hairdresser, a wallpaperer and a painter. He actively contributes to im-proving the situation of older ex-prostitutes and is currently vice-chairman of the charitable or-ganisation Pandora.
Dirk Van Vaerenbergh
° 1954, Aalst, Belgium
Dirk Van Vaerenbergh is an actor who is passionate about languages. He taught Swedish language and literature at the University of Ghent, but at the end of the last century made a definitive choice for a career in acting. He acted in musicals such as Company (Royal Ballet of Flanders) and Amadeus (Music Hall) and already worked together with director Frank Van Laecke in Kuifje en de zonnetempel (Tintin and the Temple of the Sun), Im Weissen Rössl, Die Fledermaus and Daens – the musical. As a member of Ensemble Leporello he acted in productions such as Macbethbranding, Fool for Love and Hoe het varken aan zijn krulstaart kwam. He made guest appearances on TV and in various films (Spoed, De Man, De Kotmadam, Wittekerke, Aspe, Niet voor Publicatie, Hof van Assisen, Booh!).
Dirk does not need much to make him happy. All he needs is a book (by Murakami, Yates, Mc Ewan) or some poetry (by Pessoa, Szymborska and Kavafis), a cup of coffee at a sidewalk café (in Ghent, The Hague, London or New York), an iPod in his ears (R. Strauss, Wagner, Mahler, Amy Winehouse or Rufus Wainwright). Or you can take him out to dinner (pasta vongole, vitello tonato or köttbullar i tomatsås) and he will simply be delighted.
He loves the play of light in paintings by Hopper and the whimsical aspects of Keith Haring, furniture by Gispen and Starck and films by Egoyan and Almodóvar.
This is the first time in his life he will wear a dress.
He feels privileged to work with colleagues such as these.
He dedicates this Gardenia to his husband and stepson.
www.dirkvanvaerenbergh.com
Rudy Suwyns
° 1944, Ghent, Belgium
At the age of five, Rudy Suwyns took his first steps on the stage of the Ghent Opera House. He studied at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Ghent and the Academy of Music in Gentbrugge. He was affiliated with the Ghent theatre company Romain Deconinck in the Minardschouwburg for thirteen years (1968-1981) and is a permanent staff member of the biannual Festivaria outdoor operetta and musical festival held at the Donkmeer Lake in Ghent. He was engaged as a director and actor at the Kortijk Lyrical Theatre Company, Kunst Veredelt Roeselare and the Tielt Operetta Podium. He participated in opera productions of Nabucco, La Bohème, Carmen, Aïda, La Traviata and Don Pasquale at Music Hall and toured with them throughout Europe on several occasions. He played in the theatrical production of Cyrano de Bergerac and worked together with director Frank Van Laecke in the musicals Kuifje en de zonnetempel (Tintin and the Temple of the Sun) and Daens – the musical. Rudy Suwyns also makes frequent appearances in films and television series.
Hendrik Lebon
