SHORT RESUME
Originally from Düsseldorf, Greta moved to the unique creative beat of Berlin in 1989, the year before the Wall came down. Here, shortly after graduating from the
Hanover University of Music, Drama and Media, where she studied from 1983 to 1987, she began her acting career on the stage of the most well-known Berlin off-theater group at the time, "Zum
westlichen Stadthirschen". Her artistic curiosity and craft would soon take her to Poland, Italy and Moscow, with a 2-year stopover in the master class for directing and acting at the GITIS
Academy.
For three decades now, Greta has been on a multi-faceted adventure as a pan-European artist. She is not only an actress with 30 years of stage, film and television
experience, but also a director, casting director with over 50 productions, lecturer for 18 years, producer, recognized researcher in the field of performing arts and also a mentor for directors
in screenwriting and production. With her artist duo "Superbohemians" and guest artists, she has been producing works for film, stage and new media since 2015.
The combination of her training as an actress and director and her practical experience is one of a kind. That is why she is regularly invited by leading European
film and theater schools to teach her post-graduate master classes and pass on her knowledge to young artists, for example at the National Danish Film School, the Danish National School of
Performing Arts, the Deutsche Film- und Fernsehakademie Berlin (DFFB) or the Catalyst Institute for Creative Arts and Technology in Berlin. Greta is also politically committed to gender equality,
diversity and fights against any kind of discrimination.
DETAILED RESUME
Greta Amend is a german actress, director, lecturer, researcher, former casting director, artist, and producer for film and theatre.
She entered the entertainment industry early as a professional actress for theatre and film, and has always been driven by a strong interest in the art of acting, teaching and directing. She studied drama at the Hanover University for Music, Theatre and Media from 1983 to 1987, graduating by playing in "Toda esta larga noche" (This is the long night) by Jorge Díaz - and writing & directing her first medium-long film "Full House - House of Fools" (33 min.), which premièred at the European Media Art Festival (EMAF) in Osnabrück 1987.
Between 1990 and 1992 she continued her studies with Anatolij Vasil`jev at the Theatre School of Dramatic Arts in Moscow. With the International Theatre Centre Akt-Zent and the GITIS Academy Moscow she studied from 1996 to 1998 in the Masterclass "Acting and Directing", including most acting and directing techniques based on the Russian school. Amongst her outstanding teachers were Prof. Vassili Skorik, Prof. Jurij Alschitz and Prof. Sergej Issayev.
Gretas substancial education as performing artist is enriched by her participation in the international theatre and film directing workshops of Künstlerhaus Bethanien which enjoyed cult status in the Berlin of the early 90´s. Greta studied with directors Krzysztof Kieślowski, Andrej Wajda, Peter Palitzsch, Thomas Schulte-Michels, Ruth Zapora, Sergej Ashkenasy, Yoshi Oida and Wojiech Marczewski. Additional private lessons involved comprehensive Michael Chechov scene work with Israel Olshan, and extensive repertoire work with actors from Peter Stein´s former ensemble of Schaubühne Berlin. Amongst her film training teachers were danish director Henning Carlsen and Rae Allen.
Greta has been pursuing her acting career by working extensively in theatre productions with numerous foreign and local companies in Europe. Her
role portfolio spans from clasical parts like Maria Timofeevna Lebyadkina in "Demons", Titania in "A midsummer nights dream", Nastassja Fillipowna in "Idiot", Polina in "Gambler", Masha in "Three
sisters", Eboli in "Don Carlos", or Diotima in "Symposion" to contemporary lead roles like The Woman in "Laughing wild" or Mensch in "Act without words I and II" by Samuel Beckett. See "Acting"
in the menue.
In 2002 Greta launched a new career as casting director for Grundy Ufa TV Production in Potsdam Babelsberg, being responsible for the serial casting of Europe’s most popular daily soap opera "Gute Zeiten/Schlechte Zeiten”. Since 2005 she has been an independent casting director for cinema productions, amongst them the biggest russian-european screen epic in history: "DAU" by Ilya Khrzhanovsky (Ukraine | Russia | Netherlands | Germany | Sweden - currently touring from Paris to London), or "Stadt, Land, Fluss" by Benjamin Cantu, which won the Teddy Award at Berlinale 2011. A score of several independent features followed. Greta specialized in finding the right actors ensemble for short film productions, and has been casting more than 40 productions of the German Film Academy Berlin dffb and independent productions until today.
In 2008 Greta directed her cross-over project "First public audition for actors in Germany", in which she explored the borders and possibilities between the casting process and exchange of performance in front and behind the camera. 200 actors from all over Europe participated in a 16 hour marathon casting including scene work. 50 of them were later acting part in the Performance "Misconception in the city" during the Long Night of Museums in the Museum für Kommunikation Berlin, based on Christopher Durang´s "Laughing Wild" .
In 2011 Greta founded the "Actors Roundtable", a symposion on the profession of today´s acting, which took place as an event series in her long time cooperation partner Museum für Kommunikation Berlin, as well as in the Theater 89 in Mitte.
In 2012 she adapted and directed the theatre play "White nights" by russian author Fjodor Dostojevsky at the Theater an der Glocksee, Hannover.
(review in german here)
Since 2012 he´s been participating in the "International Directors´ and trainers´ Colloqiums" of the European Association for Theatre Culture, the International Theatre Institute ITI, and Akt-Zent International Theatre Centre Berlin, focusing on new training methods and theatre ethics. She has been practising with masters like Peter Oskarson, Jurij Alschitz, Masaki Iwana, Oleg Liptsin and Alejandro González Puche.
Greta has been ahead of her time in creating and teaching highly acclaimed, innovative, hands-on training concepts for actors and directors, like her workshop “Energizing The Actor”, "Berlinale Special", "Respect for actors - Respect for directors", "Working with Actors", starting since 2006. She has since then been invited to schools and universities in Germany, Austria, Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands and Switzerland, and has been a guest lecturer in her masterclasses for directors and actors at the post-graduate department of the National Danish Film School (Filmskolens Efteruddannelse), the Danish National School of Performing Arts (Den Danske Scenekunstskole), the Norwegian Actors´Center (in cooperation with the Norwegian Film Institute), the German Film- and Television Academy dffb Berlin, the XXL EU Experts Workshop, Vienna, and in her masterclasses at the Medienakademie Hamburg. Her workshop concepts, like "Respect for Actors" cover the fields of directing, casting, and acting.
In 2015 she founded the "Superbohemians", a multidisciplinary working group of european artists collaborating on film, theatre and media projects, where she has been working in various constellations with international artists from stage and screen. In recognition of her work, she is supported in several projects by the Performing Arts Fund of the Federal Ministry of Culture (
In 2021 Greta attended the Travers Festival III., where she co-created two interdisciplinary performances with the hosts Stefan Kaegi and Aljoscha Begrich of "Rimini Protokoll", as well as Jo Preußler and Stefan Wartenberg (Graffiti Museum) at Refshaleøen - Copenhagen Contemporary.
Since 2021 Greta teaches at the Catalyst Institute for Creative Arts and Technology at Funkhaus Berlin in the departments Film Production (BA), Screen Acting (BA) and Creative Production Film (MA Masters).
Greta is forwarding her unique knowledge in personal sessions, as a leading mentor for european directors and actors for theatre and film. Due to her capacities in art, she is invited by renowned international companies interested in conceptual and practical improving female empowerment and leadership, artistic leadership, team building and change management.
