As proud media partner of the Teddy Award, Mannschaft will award the “TEDDY Readers’ Award” 2018. These five film freaks will decide.

For over 30 years, the “Teddy Award” has honored queer films within the framework of the Berlinale. In 2018, Mannschaft Magazin will participate for the first time as media partner and present the “Teddy Readers’ Award”. Until the 15th of December, queer film fans could apply to be members of the jury. Mannschaft received a large pile of dossiers, which did not make the selection easy! Finally, they opted for a composition that unifies different aspects of filmmaking and queer interests, as diverse as possible. The Teddy will be awarded on February 23rd at the Haus der Berliner Festspiele. The 68th Berlin International Film Festival will take place from February 15 – 25, 2018 – teddyaward.tv

Martin Busse, 30

Born in Berlin, Busse is a music editor for Mannschaft, but also passionately interested in queer filmmaking. As a child, he wanted to be a director; today Martin owns no less than 600 DVDs, from Arthaus to Trash. As jury president and official representative of Mannschaft, Martin will lead the jury.

Katayun Pirdawari, 54

Katayun can be found at the Berlinale almost every year and brings along a lot of experience: she has already participated in the readers’ jury for Siegessäule and Männer Magazin. For almost thirty years, the 54-year-old with Persian background has stood up for LGBT rights and for lesbian Iranian women, including four years as a board member of the Lesbian and Gay Association LSVD. Because of the AfD, Trump, Erdogan and Putin, Katayun is particularly curious about this year’s Berlinale films.

Holger Beisitzer, 42

Holger is a regular moviegoer and once shot a “very short short film” for a competition, as he says. As a gay dad, the artist and interior designer contributes the perspective of a rainbow family.

Christine Burkart, 35

Christine is a freelance video journalist, photographer and museum pedagogue and has long been passionate about queer topics. She describes herself as openly bisexual, even if labels almost always seem too one-dimensional to her. During her studies, she dealt with art history, gender theory and film studies issues – knowledge she will gladly draw on as a juror.

Adriell Kopp, 30

For Adriell, the presence of queer film characters as well as the filming of their destinies is an essential part of finding the identity of the LGBT community. A big fan of queer cinema and a student of media studies, the 30-year-old has a well-trained eye for media aesthetics, queer art and identity politics.

Translation by Naomi Scherer