Fernanda Mandagará is a Brazilian actress and cabaret artist, living in the UK since 2015. She is also a playwright, voice over artist and independent producer. With a solid career as actress and performer, Fernanda is a versatile artist who can go easily from comedy to drama. She has strong movement and devising skills and has worked in several international productions.
Fernanda trained at East15 Drama School and UFRGS (Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul – Brazil). She also did a residency at Globe Theatre, a Directing
Residence at StoneCrabs Company; Cabaret & Drag Lab at Soho Theatre; Queerlesque course with Rubyyy Jones, Radical Cabaret with Marisa Carnesky and The Art of Drag School at Royal Vauxhall Tavern.
From 2003 to 2014 Fernanda worked as a professional actor in Brazil and was one of the founders of Teatro Enlatado Theatre Company, based in São Paulo. During this period, she was in many professional theatre productions as actor, playwright and producer, working with many important Brazilian theatre companies. Fernanda also did several commercials, television and cinema participations and voice over works.
In London, her credits as actress and performer include Where We Began (Camden People’s Theatre, HighTide Festival and national tour), Taylor Mac A 24-Decade History of Popular Music (Barbican), Brazil Diversity (Theatre 503), I Walk in your Words (RichMix and Omnibus Theatre), Turmoil (Cervantes Theatre, Wandsworth Festival, Courtyard Theatre), For Elise (Embassy of Brazil in London), among others. In 2017, with Ramiro Silveira, she started Tropical Company where she performed in the shows Invisible Museum (VAULT Festival) and Tropicalia Island (Arcola Theatre, CASA, Ventnor and VAULT Festival), both written and produced by her. She also directed the show The End of All Miracles (Albany). As her drag, Lola Del Fuego, Fernanda Mandagará has presented cabaret acts in several venues in London, including Royal Vauxhall Tavern and Bethnal Working Men’s Club.
Fernanda was the winner of Focus Award 2019, category best Brazilian Performer in UK, and the Press Award UK 2017, category best Theatre Producer (awards given by the Brazilian International Press to Brazilian outstanding artists working in UK). In 2019 she was nominated for LUKAS Award (UK Latin Award), category Best performer and Best Show for Tropicalia Island. Her show Invisible Museum was nominated for Best Show of the Week in the VAULT Festival 2020. In the same year Arts Council commissioned her in the programme Developing Your Creative Practice to research about the language of Cabaret.
REVIEWS
“Mandagará was very mesmerising throughout the performance.”
The Theatre Reviewer Website
“Mandagará’s exuberance is certainly captivating.”
Calum McIntosh, A Younger Theatre Website
“Fernanda Mandagará‘s Vladine is the ultimate diva.”
Lucy Basaba, Theatre Full Stop Website
“Fernanda Mandagará as The Imposter spouts a plethora of political plaudits and is seriously deranged in her delivery.”
Rich Jevons, The Reviews Hub Website
“LIFE is getting tougher for satirists and comedians by the day. Just how do they satirise a world of Donald Trump, Boris Johnson and Brexit? Hogarth would have been left scratching his head. But Brazilian writer and actress Fernanda Mandagará achieved the rare thing of making a mockery of one of the most serious crisis facing us – refugees. Her comedy Tropicalia Island sends up Theresa May’s hostile environment for refugees, Trump’s wall across the US-Mexican border, Brexit and the obsession with keeping people out”
Leo Garib, Islington Tribune Magazine
“Yet, precisely because of the truth in the officer’s words (Fernanda Mandagará) does it also send an incredibly grounding and peaceful message to the audience.”
Margarita Shivarova, The Reviews Hub Website