Biljana Srbljanović

Biljana Srbljanović (Serbian Cyrillic: Биљана Србљановић, pronounced [bǐʎana sr̩bʎǎːnoʋitɕ]; born 15 October 1970) is a Serbian playwright and university professor.

Biljana Srbljanović
Биљана Србљановић
Srbljanović in June 2008
Born (1970-10-15) 15 October 1970
Stockholm, Sweden
NationalitySerbian
EducationFaculty of Dramatic Arts
Alma materUniversity of Arts in Belgrade
Occupations
Spouse
​
​
(m. 2006; div. 2014)​

She has written eleven theater plays and screenplay for Otvorena vrata television series that aired on Radio Television of Serbia during the mid-1990s. Her plays have been staged in some 50 countries. Srbljanović is also a part-time lecturer at the University of Arts' Faculty of Dramatic Arts (FDU) in Belgrade. On 1 December 1999, she became the first non-German writer to receive the Ernst Toller Prize. She is the recipient of various theatre awards in Serbia, including the Dragiša Kašiković Award, Slobodan Selenić Award, City of Belgrade Award, Joakim Vujić Statuette, and Sterija Award. Furthermore, she received the 2003 Osvajanje slobode Award, an annual accolade given out by the Serbian Civic Alliance (GSS) political party to women for "contributions in promotion of human rights, democracy, and tolerance in political communication".

In 2007, she was awarded the IX Europe Prize Theatrical Realities, in Thessaloniki.[1][2]

Early life

Srbljanović was born on 15 October 1970 in Stockholm whereto her father Danilo Srbljanović had arrived a few years earlier during late 1960s as gastarbeiter from SFR Yugoslavia in search of better employment opportunities.[3][4][5] He would soon be joined by his girlfriend Miroslava Simić who came over from Yugoslavia. The couple wed in the Yugoslav embassy in Stockholm—a civil ceremony presided over by ambassador Vladimir Rolović—and had their daughter Biljana. In April 1971, months after her parents' wedding, the embassy was attacked by a group of Croatian Ustashe-affiliated terrorists led by Miro Barešić who assassinated ambassador Rolović.[6]

Writing career

Srbljanović obtained her dramaturgy degree in 1995 at the Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Belgrade. The first play she wrote, Beogradska trilogija (The Belgrade Trilogy), was premiered in 1997 in Belgrade, Serbia at the Yugoslav Drama Theater. After its huge success, the play was staged in many other countries, including Italy, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, England, and the Scandinavian countries.

In April 1998 her second play, Porodične priče (Family Stories), was written in Belgrade and staged at Atelje 212. It won the Best New Play Award at the theatre festival in Novi Sad, Serbia and was later staged in Germany, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, United States, Switzerland, the Netherlands, France and elsewhere.

In December 1999, Srbljanović completed The Fall, which premiered in July 2000 at the City Theater Festival in Budva, Montenegro. Due to lack of public interest, the play was quickly erased from the program of Belgrade's theaters.

The young artist can also be seen in the Serbian movie Land of Truth, Love and Freedom (Zemlja istine ljubavi i slobode) as an actress in a leading role.[7]

The premiere of Supermarket, her fourth play, took place in May 2001 at the Festival of Vienna, Austria. It is still staged in many European countries.

In late 2003, Srbljanović completed her fifth play, America, Part Two. This became Serbia's most popular play in 2003 and 2004.

Srbljanović's next play, Skakavci (Locusts), won the New Theatrical Realities Award, one of Europe's most prominent theatre awards. In the 2005-06 season, German theater magazine Theater Heute proclaimed Srbljanović the best foreign playwright of the season.[8]

Her latest play This Grave Is Too Small For Me has attracted international press attention as well as acclaim from various audiences in Europe.[9]

Europe Theatre Prize

In 2007, she received the IX Europe Prize Theatrical Realities, in Thessaloniki, with the following motivation:

For her and for the people of her country which has suffered so much, it is undoubtedly the epithet “European prize” that imports more as a confirmation of the fact that the Serbs are present and will be always present on this continent. Living in Serbia and in Europe at the same time, Biljana Srbljanović is not kind at all towards her compatriots: in the “Belgrad Trilogy”, she revealed their dissimulated, two-faced morality; then, with anger, she draws a caricature of them in the “Family Stories”. This author belongs to the current of the new European drama - courageous, open, brutal and it is not only in her own place that she’s offensive: in “The Supermarket”, she left for the superficial Occident, than she had the courage to attack and criticise “L’Amerika”- it is in this part, that came to maturity her ability to realise character’s deep, psychological characterization. “The Fall” analyzes people living in countries with totalitarian regimes, and in “The Locusts”, she goes back in her own country in the aim to draw a historical picture of four generations which worked out the corroded country’s actual face. Biljana Srbljanović is not the only one politically committed playwright who criticizes with ferocity her own country’s regime and the people supporting this regime: last year, Harold Pinter’s name has proved us that she‘s not alone in her case. At all monochromic, Biljana Srbljanović’s Balkans, have an outstanding environment; - rough, frank, quarrelsome and mystical. More than any of her predecessors, this playwright brought Balkans closer to the Europe and made us think about how much Balkan spirit is present in our souls as well. Her voice strongly echoed over the whole continent.[10]

Political career

Liberal Democratic Party (LDP)

In April 2007, Srbljanović officially joined the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), with an additional role as a member of the party's newly-established political council.[11] Alongside Srbljanović, other individuals appointed to the LDP political council were: Vesna Pešić (council president), Biljana Kovačević-Vučo, Bojan Đurić, Branko Dimitrijević, Dejan Sinadinović, Filip David, Ivan Andrić, Ivan Torov, Jadranka Jelinčić, Jasna Šakota, Latinka Perović, Miroslav Prokopijević, Miša Šahović, Nenad Prokić, Nikola Samardžić, Olivera Ježina, Petar Luković, Rajko Danilović, Saška Stanojlović, Sonja Biserko, Srbijanka Turajlić, Veljko Đurović, Vera Marković, Vladimir Gligorov, Vladimir Todorić, Zoran Ostojić, and Zoran Purešević.

In late March 2008, Srbljanović was announced as LDP's candidate for mayor of Belgrade at the upcoming May 2008 local elections.[12]

Six months after the party's poor electoral showing in various Belgrade municipalities, she publicly complained on her personal blog of being marginalized by the LDP, specifically that "everyone within the party, except for Vesna Pešić and Žarko Korać, distanced themselves [from Srbljanović]" and that she has since learned that "everyone [in the party] has a price, whether it's commercial real estate in municipalities where LDP is part of the ruling coalition or salaried positions at the state-owned enterprises or an opportunity for future [financial and political] deals".[13] Though quickly deleted, the blog post caused a lot of reaction from her party colleagues.[14] Days later, reportedly following a talk with the party president Čedomir Jovanović who had in the meantime publicly expressed his support for the playwright's future in the party,[15] Srbljanović came out with a statement that interpersonal relations within the party are good while relaying a personal opinion that LDP is "the best political party in Serbia".[16]

She has quietly left the party at some point over the years since.

Other activities

Ana Brnabić's Council for Creative Industries

In March 2018, Srbljanović's appointment to the newly-established Government of Serbia Council for Creative Industries was announced. Formed and launched by Serbia's Prime Minister Ana Brnabić, the council is envisioned as a "gathering of individuals and organizations possessing a wealth of experience in creative industries who will help the Prime Minister fully understand the needs of that sector and make informed decisions for its future development".[17] In addition to Srbljanović, other council members include marketing expert Lazar Džamić, Tijana Palkovljević Bugarski, Vuk Veličković, art historian Aleksandra Lazar, Youth Initiative for Human Rights NGO founder Andrej Nosov, Igor Todorović, Milan Marković, Jasna Dimitrijević, visual artist Slavimir Stojanović as well as representatives of Exit Foundation, Mokrin House, Serbia Film Commission, Startit, and Nova iskra.[17]

Immediately after the announcement of her appointment to the governmental agency, Srbljanović faced criticism of selling out to the government from various individuals including political activist Aida Ćorović.[18][19]

Six month after the council was formed, in an October 2018 Nedeljnik interview, Serbia PM Brnabić praised Srbljanović as "an intellectual she especially admires, someone who criticizes the government but is also willing to help" while adding that Serbia would be a better place if it had more brave people like her".[20][21]

Heartefact fund

Srbljanović is the program director of the Heartefact fund, a Belgrade-based non-governmental organization active since 2009 in the Western Balkans politically-defined region, that among its mission lists "rethinking of contemporary artistic, social and political issues and phenomena at national [Serbia], regional [Western Balkans] and European levels" and "advocating new models of production, regional [Western Balkans] cooperation and alternative forms of education" through "developing policies that support Erinnerungskultur (culture of remembrance), democratic values, human rights, freedom of speech and public sphere accountability".[22]

Hertefact's organizational structure also includes Andrej Nosov, Živana Janković, Mirjana Milivojević, Aleksandra Lozanović, and Vana Filipovski while its governing board consists of FDU vice-dean Ana Martinoli, PR manager and piano professor Jelena Milašinović, political scientist, advisor, and NGO administrator Ivan Vejvoda, public advocate and lobbyist Goran Miletić, and actor Branko Cvejić.[22] The organization is financed by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), Open Society Foundations' Serbian branch, U.S. embassy in Serbia, European Union's Creative Europe programme, Serbian government's Ministry of Culture and Information, Swiss embassy in Serbia, Kingdom of the Netherlands, Heinrich Böll Foundation, etc.[22]

Views and opinions

Srbljanović has for decades been an outspoken figure in the Serbian public sphere.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, during her university days, Srbljanović was a close friend of Isidora Bjelica and wrote for the right-wing Pogledi magazine.[23]

By mid-1990s, Srbljanović's political views swung to the left as she began fiercely opposing the policies of Slobodan Milošević as well as views held by individuals and parties in the Serbian political opposition on the right side of the political spectrum. In 1997, as one of the guests on Olja Bećković's Utisak nedelje talk programme on Studio B, Srbljanović squared off against her former Pogledi editor-in-chief Miloslav Samardžić over the issue of American magnate George Soros injecting funds into the pro-Western Serbian media outlets, primarily B92.[24]

Even after the 5 October 2000 Overthrow in Serbia, she continued railing against what she viewed to be "the irresponsibility of the political elite in Serbia", "Serbian violent nationalism" and "the culture of violence and exclusion in Serbian daily life". From May 2006 until February 2009, she maintained her own blog on the B92.net site[25] where among other things she frequently criticized various individuals, mostly Serbian politicians and other public figures who displayed political opinions she opposes such as Nebojša Krstić, adviser to the Serbian president Boris Tadić.

In 2010 Srbljanović opened a Twitter account where she continued commenting on Serbian politics. During late summer 2011, she got into several heated exchanges with the Democratic Party (DS) spokeswoman Jelena Trivan.[26][27]

The artist is signatory of the Declaration on the Common Language of the Croats, Serbs, Bosniaks and Montenegrins within the project Languages and Nationalisms (Jezici i nacionalzmi).[28] The declaration is against political separation of four Serbo-Croatian standard variants that leads to a series of negative social, cultural and political phenomena in which linguistic expression is enforced as a criterion of ethno-national affiliation and as a means of political loyalty in successor states of Yugoslavia.[29]

Controversy

Libel suit

In March 2001, Srbljanović was sued for libel by film director Emir Kusturica as a result of her Vreme magazine op-ed in which she passingly refers to the director as "Milošević's immoral profiteer", accusing him of "direct collaboration with the [Milošević] regime through Milorad Vučelić [Kusturica's friend and Serbian state-owned TV (RTS) general-director]" based on her earlier claim within the piece that Kusturica's 1995 film Underground was "mostly financed by the Milošević-controlled RTS".[30][31] Six months later, in September 2001 right before the first court date, Vreme magazine organized a mediation attempt between the two parties, with Kusturica and Srbljanović meeting face to face in the magazine's offices.[32] At the meeting Kusturica reportedly expressed willingness to drop the lawsuit if Srbljanović issues a public apology, which Srbljanović refused.[32] The next day at the first court date Srbljanović once again rejected the offer of a public apology.[32]

In December 2003, two and a half years after the initial filing, a municipal court (opštinski sud) in Belgrade ruled in Kusturica's favour as Srbljanović's claims couldn't stand up to closer scrutiny after Kusturica's attorney Branislav Tapušković provided a complete documentation of Underground producers and financiers, proving that funding mostly came from several France-based production companies while parts of the movie were only shot on RTS sound stages in Belgrade.[33]

Other

In July 2007 Srbljanović criticized basketball player Milan Gurović on her blog, referring to him as "that tattooed idiot", for having a tattoo of World War II Chetnik leader Draža Mihailović on his arm.[34]

Additionally, Srbljanović aroused controversy with her 18 February 2012 tweet referring to the news item about former Serbian interior minister Dragan Jočić getting extra police security following the arrest of the organized crime figure Luka Bojović. Srbljanović's tweet — "'Jočić getting extra security detail' why? he ain't gonna run" — mocked the fact Jočić is physically disabled ever since his 2008 car accident.[35]

Srbljanović set off a torrent of negative sentiment from the general public in Serbia after making an awkward joke on Twitter during the catastrophic May 2014 floods. The tweet in Serbian read "Excuse me for not being compassionate, but you have 10 more minutes to swim to the gallery for the promotion of the book Tomato". A flurry of tweets, Facebook posts and news updates were quick to condemn the post, and her Twitter account @leyakeller became unavailable not long after [36]

In January 2019, Srbljanović posted a vicious Facebook reaction to a tweet by the actor and newly-appointed Movement of Free Citizens (PSG) leader Sergej Trifunović whom she had previously collaborated with professionally in addition to a temporal overlap in their early 1990s respective studies at the University of Arts' Faculty of Dramatic Arts (FDU). Prompted by Trifunović tweeting about her early 1990s right-wing views and political activism—specifically a tweet in which the actor-turned-politician recalls witnessing "the leather-overcoat-and-Doc Martens-clad first year dramaturgy student and White Eagles member Srbljanović barge into the FDU commissary by kicking the door in anger and, in a manner of a political commissar, admonish the gathered crowd for 'eating and drinking while our brothers are dying in Slavonia and Baranya'"[37]—Srbljanović launched into an obscenity-laced, insult-laden tirade on her Facebook account, denouncing Trifunović's morality, professionalism, personal hygiene, and accusing him of "responsibility in the assassination of Zoran Đinđić".[38][39][40][41] Serbian actress, film producer, and former FDU student Bojana Maljević, who has also had a prior professional history with Srbljanović, supported the veracity of the event Trifunović mentioned in his original tweet.[42][43]

Personal

In 2006 Srbljanović married Gabriel Keller, former French ambassador in Serbia. The couple divorced in 2014.[44] Srbljanović is related to Radovan Karadžić, wartime political leader of Bosnian Serbs, sentenced to 40 years in prison by the international tribunal at The Hague.[45][46][47]

Drug possession arrest

Srbljanović was detained by police on 1 December 2011 while buying cocaine in Belgrade from twenty-seven-year-old street dealer Miloš "Šone" Stanojčić and had a criminal investigation request (krivična prijava) filed against her for possession of illegal substances.[48] According to the information she provided during police hearing, in addition to the drug purchase she was caught for, Srbljanović had also bought drugs from the same dealer four days earlier, each time paying €60.[49][50] Despite providing a detailed account of events at the police hearing, two months later on 7 February 2012 during the hearing before the investigative judge (istražni sudija) Srbljanović used the right to silence as her defence.[48] The forty-one-year-old playwright ended up not having charges pressed against her by taking a plea deal from the prosecutor's office in late March 2012—agreeing to donate RSD200,000 to charity as well as to testify against the dealer who sold her the drugs.[51]

Works
  • Beogradska trilogija (1997)
  • Porodične priče (1998)
  • Pad (2000)
  • Supermarket (2001)
  • Amerika drugi deo (2003)
  • Skakavci (2005)
  • Barbelo, o psima i deci (2007)
  • Nije smrt biciklo (da ti ga ukradu) (2011)
  • Mali mi je ovaj grob (2013)
  • Tuđe srce ili pozorišni traktat o granici (2016)
  • Vrat od stakla (2018)
  • Intimnost (2020)

See also

References
  1. "Palmares". Premio Europa per il Teatro (in Italian). Retrieved 2 January 2023.
  2. "Europe Theatre Prize - XI Edition - premio". archivio.premioeuropa.org. Retrieved 2 January 2023.
  3. Interview in Yugoslav teen magazine Super Tin (June 1997) on the website Yugopapir, retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  4. Article commemorating the assassination of Yugoslav ambassador in Sweden in Kurir, retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  5. Text of the speech (emigrant; p. 14) on the website issuu, retrieved on 2018-08-18.
  6. Biljana Srbljanovic: Dok je ambasador Rolović umirao u mukama Barešić je poljubio Brajkovića i radosno vikao u slavu ustaških ideala, 5 August 2016
  7. Full movie (with English subtitles) on YouTube, retrieved on 2018-08-22.
  8. B92 – News – Society – Serbian playwright wins prestigious award Archived 2007-09-29 at the Wayback Machine
  9. Brownell, Ginanne (22 May 2014). "Biljana Srbljanovic on Her New Play". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 7 September 2015.
  10. "XI Edizione". Premio Europa per il Teatro (in Italian). Retrieved 15 February 2023.
  11. B92 - Vesti - Lečić napustio predsedništvo LDP-a - Internet, Radio i TV stanica; najnovije vesti iz Srbije
  12. LDP: Biljana Srbljanović za Beograd u Evropi, March 2008
  13. Biljana Srbljanović: Skrajnuta sam u LDP, November 2008
  14. Biljana Srbljanović: LDP me izbrisao, November 2008
  15. LDP: Biljani Srbljanović sva vrata otvorena, November 2008
  16. Biljana Srbljanović: Nema sukoba u LDP svi se volimo, November 2008
  17. Lazar Džamić i Biljana Srbljanović članovi Saveta za kreativne industrije koji je osnovala premijerka Brnabić, Blic, 23 March 2018
  18. Gedošević, L. (28 March 2018). ""MNOGO SI KU..EVITA" Fejsbuk goreo zbog žestoke svađe Biljane Srbljanović i Aide Ćorović". Blic. Retrieved 21 April 2022.
  19. Živanović, K. (29 March 2018). "Savet za kreativne industrije: Samopromocija ili iskrena namera premijerke?". Danas. Retrieved 21 April 2022.
  20. Brnabićeva o "udaru" na Sergeja Trifunovića, B92, 11 October 2018
  21. Ana Brnabić o tome zašto je Sergej Trifunović na udaru, a zašto Srbiji treba više Biljana Srbljanović, Blic, 11 October 2018
  22. Heartefact, About Us
  23. Stojićević, Slobodan (26 March 2008). "СТАРА ЉУБАВ ЗАБОРАВА НЕМА". Politika. Retrieved 20 December 2014.
  24. Samardžić, Miloslav (2008). "Nikola je bio najbolji!". Svedok. Archived from the original on 21 December 2014. Retrieved 20 December 2014.
  25. http://blog.b92.net/blog/105/Biljana%20Srbljanovi%C4%87/ Biljana's blog.b92.net
  26. Okršaj Srbljanović-Trivan na Tviteru Archived 2012-02-25 at the Wayback Machine;Blic, 23 August 2011
  27. Svađa Biljane Srbljanović i Jelene Trivan na Tviteru;Blic, 20 September 2011
  28. Derk, Denis (28 March 2017). "Donosi se Deklaracija o zajedničkom jeziku Hrvata, Srba, Bošnjaka i Crnogoraca" [A Declaration on the Common Language of Croats, Serbs, Bosniaks and Montenegrins is About to Appear]. Večernji list (in Serbo-Croatian). Zagreb. pp. 6–7. ISSN 0350-5006. Archived from the original on 20 September 2017. Retrieved 5 June 2019.
  29. Jezici i nacionalzmi Archived 9 August 2018 at the Wayback Machine, official website, retrieved on 2018-08-16.
  30. Kusturica encore montré du doigt;allocine.fr, 27 September 2001
  31. Umesto pomirenja - tužba;Glas javnosti, 14 September 2001
  32. "Ko je (ne)moralan?". blic.rs. 14 September 2001.
  33. Srbljanović kriva za klevetu;Večernje novosti, 28 December 2003
  34. Biljana Srbljanovic blog, 21 July 2007
  35. Biljana Srbljanović se sprda s invalidima! Archived 29 February 2012 at the Wayback Machine;Kurir, 25 February 2012
  36. Kurir Daily, 19 May 2014 Archived 28 August 2014 at the Wayback Machine
  37. Trifunović, Sergej (19 January 2019). "tweet by Sergej Trifunović on 19 Jan 2019, 2:24pm". Archived from the original on 24 May 2022. Retrieved 19 April 2022.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  38. Srbljanović, Biljana (19 January 2019). "Facebook post by Biljana Srbljanović on 19 Jan 2019, 3:59pm". Archived from the original on 26 April 2023. Retrieved 19 April 2022.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  39. M., M. (20 January 2019). "Pljušte psovke i uvrede između Sergeja Trifunovića i Biljane Srbljanović". Blic. Retrieved 12 February 2019.
  40. Živanović, K. (22 January 2019). "Trifunović: "Pucaju" na mene iz svih raspoloživih oružja". Danas. Retrieved 12 February 2019.
  41. "Biljana Srbljanović, jedna od najuglednijih dramatičarki u regiji, po mrežama se tabloidno mlati sa Sergejom Trifunovićem". Telegram.hr. 20 January 2019. Retrieved 12 February 2019.
  42. Maljević, Bojana (19 January 2019). "tweet by Bojana Maljević on 19 Jan 2019, 2:56pm". Archived from the original on 4 December 2022. Retrieved 19 April 2022.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  43. M., M. (21 January 2019). "U raspravu Sergeja Trifunovića i Biljane Srbljanović se uključila i Bojana Maljević. I nije branila NJU". Blic. Retrieved 12 February 2019.
  44. "PressOnline: Razvela se Biljana Srbljanovic i ima novog decka, PressOnline, 17.7.2014". Archived from the original on 27 May 2022. Retrieved 27 March 2016.
  45. Kolega, Katarina (8 March 2006). "Krv prenosi samo viruse". Slobodna Dalmacija. Archived from the original on 19 August 2014. Retrieved 24 February 2019.
  46. "Intervju Biljane Srbljanović Slobodnoj Dalmaciji: Krv prenosi samo viruse". Glas javnosti. Tanjug. 10 March 2006. Retrieved 24 February 2019.
  47. Munjin, Bojan (2008). "BILJANA SRBLJANOVIĆ, SPISATELJICA I NESUĐENA GRADONAČELNICA BEOGRADA : MISLILA SAM DA ME SARAJEVO NE ŽELI". BH Dani. Retrieved 19 April 2022.
  48. "Biljana Srbljanović se izvukla za kokain!". Frankfurtske vesti. 23 March 2012.
  49. ""Od Srbljanovićkinog kokaina sam mogao da napravim špansku seriju"". Frankfurtske vesti. 3 November 2012.
  50. "French envoy's wife accused of possession of cocaine". News.Az. 13 March 2012. Archived from the original on 1 February 2014. Retrieved 4 November 2012.
  51. Dileru Biljane Srbljanović 3,5 godine zatvora, Večernje novosti (in Serbian)
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