Andrej Rozman Roza – poet, playwright, and actor – was born in 1955 in Ljubljana, where he still lives. In 1978, he abandoned the Slovene studies programme at the university and, with friends, started the theatre Pocestno gledališče Predrazpadom (in English, Before-the-Breakup Street Theatre). In the following years, he organized a number of well-received performances in Ljubljana by visiting street theatres from abroad – which helped overcome the authorities’ fear of spontaneous street happenings. In 1981, he founded the Ana Monró Theatre. In 1990, with this theatre, he started holding competitions in theatre improv, which today have become extremely popular throughout Slovenia. He writes parodistic and comic poems, fairy tales, and comedies for children and adults; he reworks classic texts for other media, transposes them to contemporary life, or simply translates them. In March 2003, he founded Rozinteater, where he stages exclusively his own texts, either as solo performances or with other actors. In 2009, he founded a religious movement (Zeroitism) for all who believe that it is possible in Slovenia to have a zero percent tax on products that propagate the Slovene language, and he holds rites that help to promote his religion. He has received a number of awards, most recently, in 2010, Slovenia’s prestigious Prešeren Fund Prize for Literature.
