Roviros Manthoulis

Roviros Manthoulis initially studied Political Science at Panteion University, then pursued Film and Theater at Syracuse University in New York. In the mid-1950s, he collaborated with EIR in translating and adapting works from the American repertoire for the "Wednesday Theater." From 1956, and for about a decade, he served as a professor and Director of Studies at the Ioannidis and Stavrakos Film Schools. In 1957, he was hired by the Ministry of Press to organize a Documentary Department. In 1958, he co-founded the Group of 5, a creative documentary movement in Greece, with Heracles Papadakis, Roussos Koundouros, Fotis Mesthenaios, and Giannis Bakogiannopoulos. That same year, he staged William Saroyan's play "My Heart's in the Highlands" at the Athens Theater and the Lefkada Festival. He collaborated with the magazine "Cinema - Theater," directed by Giannis Bakogiannopoulos, and was active in developing film clubs in Greece. As General Program Director of Greek Television, he oversaw its transformation into ERT (1975) and YENED into ERT2 (1982). He directed award-winning films such as "Face to Face," "Hands Up," "Hitler," "Blues with Tight Lips," "The Greek Civil War," and the Greek-French co-production "Lilly's Story" (Venice Festival). His first collaboration with French Television was as director and principal filmmaker of the documentary series "On the World’s Poster," which was awarded Best Program by the French Critics Association in 1969. For European Television, he produced 90 sociological documentaries, feature films, musicals, and the television adaptation of Stratis Tsirkas's "Unruly Cities," which was broadcast 50 times by French Television. He served as president of the Greek Community in Paris (1991-2001) and was honored for his lifetime achievements in France with the Medal of the City of Paris. He translated Euripides' "Cyclops" and Iakovos Kambanellis's works "He and His Pants," "Odysseus Returned Home" into French for the Greek Trilogy: Ulysse, trois fois Ulysse (with collaboration on French dialogues by Régine Achille-Fould and Evelyne Guimmara). He directed and presented the "Trilogy" at La Main d'Or Theater in Paris. He also translated (with the assistance of actress Evelyne Guimmara) and directed Giorgos Maniotis's "Common Sense" for the Avignon Festival.