Jasmine Tabatabai
Actress, Musician & Mother

Jasmin Tabatabai (Jasmin in Persian means flower) first saw the light of day on 8 June 1967 in Teheran as the youngest daughter of her parents with dual nationality. Jasmine’s German mother and Persian father had first met at the "Oktoberfest" in 1956."I had a wonderful childhood" - one believes her readily when one sees her family photos: a pretty, a "strong-willed" mother, a gentle, "very amusing" father, two starry-eyed elder sisters, Susan and Azar, and Amir, her older brother who looks like her twin.

The first upset in her life was when, aged 5, she was told: "You as a girl are not allowed to do this". Amir however was allowed. This caused a reaction with Jasmin thatled to fights with her dear brother and turned into a proper "tomboy". The second upset happened in 1978. In the turmoil of pre revolution Iran, before Khomeini's "Islamic State" their father sent wife and children into a safe but cold and strict Germany. Jasmin recalls how in the Munich suburbs of Krailling where they lived, "children were not allowed to step on the lawn". Now at the tender age of twelve, Jasmin was transplanted from the land of his father to that of her mother.

After high school, she studied music and drama at the National High School for Music and Representative Arts in Stuttgart. The first professional offers come from the theatre and she accepts an engagement with the Potsdam Hans-Otto-Theatre.

Since the beginning of the nineties Jasmin Tabatabai has been active both as an actor and a musician. She points out "acting is my life, is my profession and my vocation" and "music is the love of my life". Even as a little child Jasmin had the wish to become an actress later on in life. In a certain way this film career was predestined because Jasmin was actually born in Teheran exactly at the time her father was active in the Movie business.

With regards to music, she started with the jazz funk band "Eskimo's Ecstasy". In 1993 she created the Berlin women's band "Even Cowgirls Get The Blues" with which she went on numerous concerts throughout the German-language areas. In 1997 she left the band to pursue other interests.
She made her film debut in 1991with the movie "Children of the Open Road" where she plays the role of a gipsy girl. In her subsequent movies Jasmin has often portrayed women with a very individual mixture of strength and vulnerability.

She experienced her first commercial success and also a breakthrough in her career with Katja von Garnier's music road movie "bandits". This film was Jasmin's dream project because she could combine music and action and "do what I want". She composed nearly the entire sound track for the film and consequently received a "Golden Record" prize in 1997. With over 600,000 CDs sold, "bandits" is the most successive sound track of a European feature film.

In her later roles she continued to attract attention. As a scheming woman in Helmut Dietl's "Late Show", or as the lascivious singer Billie in Xavier Koller's adaptation of Tucholsky's "Gripsholm", she was magnificent.

Although now Jasmine’s public image is that of a wild anti-establishment feminist, she is actually very shy and a little melancholic. "I always like to represent unusual, strong but not necessarily tough women", explains Jasmin of her choice of roles. And: "I take the liberty of only playing parts which really turn me on".

Jasmin in Moonlight Tarrif

Since December 3 2002, Jasmin Tabatabai has taken on a completely new role. A role she has been looking forward to for a long time. On this day her little daughter, Angelina Sherri Rose, was born. "After all, I come from a Persian family, where they adore children", she said in an interview with the German magazine "Für Sie". The father of the child is Jasmin's companion, American Tico Zamora, whom she met in December 2001 shortly before Christmas.

Even though in earlier interviews Jasmin Tabatabai time and again emphasized that her career would take a back seat once she had children, her little daughter's birth will surely not mean the end of her career as an actress and musician.

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