Special Guests

Lamin Leroy Gibba

Black Fruit
Series Creator, Lead Actor, Head Writer, and Executive Producer

Lamin Leroy Gibba (he/him) is an actor, writer and producer. He gained early theater experiences in the youth group of the Deutsches Schauspielhaus Hamburg and later attended drama school at The New School University in New York City. He appeared in theater productions at Classical Theatre of Harlem, Performance Space New York, Theater Oberhausen, Kampnagel Hamburg, Ballhaus Naunynstraße as well as film and television productions. Lamin has written and produced several short films, including Fever Source and Cloud Zero. He wrote, co-produced, and stars in the short film Dogfriend (Hunderfreund) that screened across the world, including Tribeca Film Festival and the BFI Flare Film Festival. The film won the first prize at the International Short Film Festival Berlin and was nominated for the German Short Film Award. His play Doppelteppe zum Wald won the audience awards as well as the SWR2 Audioplay Award at the Heidelberger Stückemarkt theater festival. In 2023 Lamin appeared on the European Forbes 30 under 30 list. His TV show Black Fruit (Schwarze Früchte), in which he is the creator, showrunner, head writer and lead actor premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival and currently streams on ARD.

Michael Krummenacher

The Traitor
Director, Screenwriter

Born in 1985 in Schwyz, Switzerland. In 2005, he attended the Filmmaking Intensive Studies at Columbia University in New York before beginning his directing studies at the HFF in Munich in 2006. In 2012, his short film When Everybody’s Here was nominated for the German Short Film Award. In 2014, his graduation film Sibylle premiered at the Berlinale. In 2015, the omnibus film Wonderland, which he initiated and co-directed, premiered in the Locarno International Competition and won several national and international awards. In 2018, he directed the Sky series 8 Days with Oscar-winner Stefan Ruzowitzky. In 2019, he realized The Wall, a TV three-parter that won three German Television Awards. In 2022, he celebrated a major success with the family film The Robber Hotzenplotz, before realizing the historical drama The Traitor in 2024, which held its World Premiere at the Zurich Film Festival, and now its US Premiere at the Berlin & Beyond Film Festival in San Francisco.

Sherine Ciara Merai

Winners
Actor

Sherine Ciara Merai was born in Berlin in 2008. Her parents are from Poland and Tunisia. Sherine came into contact with the profession at an early age through her older sister Amina, who is an actress in film and theatre. She was allowed to stand in front of the camera for the first time in 2021 and quickly discovered her new great passion for film. In 2023, she played one of the lead roles in Winners. In addition to acting, she loves music, plays the drums and sings. She is also a passionate cheerleader.