Rudi Vodanovich Jacob

Rudi is of Croatian descent, and has lived and studied in Italy. Upon returning to New Zealand he attended drama school. He has experience in professional theatre, television, and film, landing one of the ten spots in New Zealand"s largest nationwide casting call with Auckland Theatre Company on the production Shew"d. He has also featured on local television series such as Outrageous Fortune, and Go Girls and various television commercials in New Zealand and abroad.

Alexander Campbell Andrew 

Alexander has worked in a broad range of contexts and styles of performance, and has trained and worked both in Australasia and Europe. He returned to New Zealand in 2006 after eight years in Europe, during which time he established the actors training organization, Act_World_Wide, in Paris 2000-2005. More recently he was Guest Lecturer in the School of Visual and Performing Arts at Charles Sturt University, NSW, Australia. He is a founder of the moving image company PaXifica and continues to work as both an actor and filmmaker.

Richard Lambeth - Charles

Richard graduated from Unitec in 2000 with a Bachelor of Performing and Screen Arts degree. The next few years saw him appear in cult series Atlantis High (in which he was a core cast member) and Being Eve, before taking the role of dazed and confused footballer Rob Talford in Christopher Banks" debut feature, Quiet Night In. After training in England at the London Actors Workshop, Richard returned to New Zealand and took on a number of feature roles, including the lead in forthcoming horror film Compound and action/thriller The Fall Guys. He is currently training in Meisner technique.

MEET THE COMMUNICATION FILM-MAKERS

Christopher Banks wrote, produced, directed, edited and scored his debut feature Quiet Night In.  It played to festival audiences in Toronto and the UK in 2005, followed by an Australasian DVD release in 2007. His work as a reporter and director on the award-winning Queer Nation series has recently been chosen as one of a handful of episodes from the shows nine-year run to be showcased by the NZ On Screen web project.

Since graduating from the New Zealand Film Academy in 2005, Andy Jalfon has produced and directed behind-the-scenes series for two of New Zealands most popular and successful programmes, Shortland Street and Dancing With The Stars. He was the Content Producer during the development of the first online catch up service in the southern hemisphere, TVNZ Ondemand, which has won the internationally-recognised Content+Innovation Award. He was also an integral part of the multi-million dollar project for the redesign and launch of the new TVNZ entertainment site. His production company produces a variety of films for a range of platforms, from on screen to online.

Their first production together, the short film Teddy, was released in 2009. So far, it has won two awards, and become the first New Zealand film to be nominated for the prestigious Iris Prize for short film-making in the UK. It has played to sold-out audiences in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch as part of the Out Takes Reel Queer Film Festival; and internationally to audiences of thousands at some of the worlds largest GLBT film festivals, including Toronto, New York, San Francisco, London, Tokyo and Los Angeles, where it has garnered high praise from filmgoers and festival directors alike.

Their second production, Communication, was released in 2010, and has won two international awards - including Outstanding Short Film at the QBliss Creating Change Community Awards in the United States.  Other QBliss award-winners included Precious director Lee Daniels, Tales Of The City author Armistead Maupin, and N-Sync star Lance Bass.

Their latest film, The Colonels Outing,  builds on the bittersweet mix of emotion which captured the hearts of audiences for Teddy and Communication, portraying a relationship between two men in the twilight of their lives in a way which few have cared to acknowledge or celebrate.  It will be released in 2011.