WILLIAM el-GARDI - Yasser Mansour
William trained at Mountview Academy. His most recent theatre credits include Touch by Rikki Beadle-Blair at the Tristan Bates in London, as well as the Theatre Café Symposium at the Unicorn with Company of Angles. He made his Edinburgh debut last year in The Container by Claire Bailey which won a Fringe First and the Amnesty International Freedom of Expression award. Other recent theatre credits include Failed States, a political Musical satire at the Pleasance Theatre-London and Time of the Tortoise at Theatre 503. National tours of: Tangier Tattoo with Glyndebourne Opera House, OneFourSeven with the Dende Collective/Lyric Hammersmith, and a Welsh national tour of Flowers from Tunisia with Theatre Ibyd/Theatre Clwyd. Other theatre includes Laters with Rikki Beadle-Blair at the Tristan Bates, Release The Beat-The Musical with Mehmet Urgen at the Arcola and Funky Stuff at the Kingshead Theatre. In Film and TV, William recently completed guest roles in the BBC series Whistleblowers, The Bill, and Channel 4's new drama Saddam's Tribe. Other recent credits include Last Flight to Kuwait for the BBC, a lead role in the BBC/HBO film Dirty War, and Danish Dogma feature, Brothers with Suzanne Beir. Other TV includes: Spooks (series3), and Black September-Days that Shook the World both for the BBC, The Sketch Show-Clithero for Channel 4 and Murder Prevention for World productions/Five.

TEUNKIE VAN DER SLUIJS - Director
Trained at the Rose Bruford College, Teunkie is an acclaimed director, actor, designer and dramaturge. His directorial credits include: Judith: A Parting from the Body (Rough Readings, Rosemary Branch Theatre, Islington), 4.48 Psychosis (Het Verdriet van de Zeedijk, Odeon, Amsterdam International Tour to Tunisia), The Expected (Opera commissioned by the Amsterdam Proms, Paradiso, Amsterdam), Henry V (Het Verdriet van de Zeedijk, El Manzah VI, Tunisia), The Madman and the Nun (Het Verdriet van de Zeedijk, University Theatre, Amsterdam), Gogol (Het Verdriet van de Zeedijk, Théâtre Albert Dumouchel, Montréal), The Bald Soprano (Kromme Nieuwe Scéne, Parnassos, Utrecht) and Yasser (Rough Readings, Rose Bruford College Studio Theatre). Teunkie is fluent in four languages, and has professional acting experience for theatre and national television in the Netherlands. He was awarded the Récherche Théâtrale Award in 2003 by the Arab Theatre Critic’s Jury at the Festival International de Monastir, Tunisia.

ABDELKADER BENALI - Writer
Author Abdelkader Benali (1975) is one of the best-known contemporary writers in the Netherlands. Born in Ighazzazen, Morocco, Benali has lived in the Netherlands since 1979. He studied history in Leiden and now lives in Amsterdam. For his first novel Wedding by the Sea he won the prestigious Geertjan Lubberhuizenprijs, the Libris Prize and the Prix de Meilleur Premier Roman Étranger in France. Other works include Feldman and I and The Long-Awaited. Benali has also written very successful theatre plays The Unlucky One and Yasser, and published his collection of stories entitiled Reports from Maanzaad Town.