Director and playwright Andrey Stadnikov was born in 1988 in Novosibirsk oblast in the town of Berdsk. He graduated from the Gerasimov State University of Cinematography where he studied film directing. He made “Gromov”, a documentary film that was a winner in the short feature category at the 2011 Message to Man International Film Festival in Saint Petersburg. He attended the School of Theatrical Leaders (at the Meyerhold Centre). He took part in the Jubilee Year Group at the Taganka Theatre. His play «The Death of Andrusha» was short-listed in the Lubimovka Young Russian Playwrights Festival (2010); it brought him a Tom Stoppard award for an outstanding début in the Free Theatre international playwriting competition; and it was long-listed in the Eurasia playwriting competition. His play «Ophelia» was short-listed in the Lubimovka Festival in 2011 and long-listed in the Eurasia competition in 2011; his play «Sun» was long-listed for the Début Prize in literature in 2011. In 2013 «Acts of Terrorism» was short-listed in both the Lubimovka Festival and the Tekstura Festival. In 2019 he won a Golden Mask award for Motherland in the Experimental Discovery category.