Gina Patrichi

In 1953 she starts attending acting classes held by Aura Buzescu at the Institute of Theatre and Film I.L. Caragiale (IATC), which she abandons three years later. She makes her stage debut in in Galaţi, where she continues to live until 1965, when she joins the Bulandra Theatre in Bucharest. The same year she makes her film debut, by playing the part of Roza in Pădurea spânzuraţilor/ The Forest of the Hanged.

"For Gina Patrichi each character is like a redoubt that has to be conquered. Most of the times, by means of surrendering. The character demands, requests and, eventually, commands. That is why the nature of her roles is each time very different. Starting with Roza from The Forest of the Hanged, to her carefully elaborated compositions in Malvina Urşianu’s films, in which the distinction and elegance of expression are at times magnified by the presence of subtle highlights of grotesque, all the way to the reporter she plays in Probă de microfon/ Microphone Test – a summum of professional vitality, the portrait in motion of a contemporary woman captured in the midst of her existential turmoil. Women, real women, destined to live life truthfully, these are the heroines whom Gina Patrichi gives herself to." (Cornel Cristian, Magazin estival Cinema 1984).
"She was of a strange, completely nonstandard beauty, powerful and powerfully moving. A harmonious face with a wide smile, glowing, contradicted by that virescent look of hers, running like deep water, which seemed to fathom some mysterious aloof space. A look you didn’t want to part with… Her presence was electrifying. Magnetic. No matter where she made her appearance – be it on stage, on the big screen, on TV, or simply on the street – the air would vibrate differently and an inarticulate and unexplainable feeling would catch hold of one’s self. Just like happiness." (Eva Sîrbu)
"Unmistakable, unrepeatable, a genuinely superb one of a kind piece of the Romanian screen." (Malvina Urşianu)