Biography

Maria-Antoaneta Tudor

(aka Maria-Antoaneta Ilie, Maria Antoaneta Toni, Maria Ilie, Antoaneta Ilie, Maria Antoaneta, Antoaneta Ilie Tudor, and Mana for friends)

is an actress, stunt performer, and singer of Romanian origin. She  has known affirmation with the theater play "The Legacy" by Marivaux, rewarded with the Public's prize at the most important annual contest for young Romanian actors, which is held annually in Mangalia, Romania with the occasion of the HOP-Uniter Gala.

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Mana was born in Bucharest - Romania, on March 7th, 1978. She is the second born in her family. She has an older brother - Mihai-Gabriel, a little brother - Alexandru, and little sister - Irina.

From the earliest age, she would like to learn to sing both piano and violin, but the financial possibilities of the family at that time have not been able to fulfill her musical wishes .

The sports skills that she demonstrated made her to be always in the spotlight. At the age of 4-5, when someone asked her what does she want to become when she grown up, she says she wants to be like Nadia Comaneci. With this plan, she started on the gymnastics road, ambitious and motivated by the image of world champion Nadia Comaneci. The grandparents were scared and said that she was born without bones they saw little Mana how she bended with of all the bones in their courtyard at the countryside. Unfortunately, her parents haven’t supported her and they even threatened her when she first went to school, that if she doesn’t learn math she will not be allowed to train for gymnastics. She wasn’t also allowed in the school’s music choir, because her elementary school teacher said that she would fill her time with things that are unnecessary in life.

At the age of 7, when her parents allowed her to give a party at home, she was so happy and made an orchestra together with her guests, playing all kinds of instruments improvised from the pot lids, and the “adding and subtraction” board, a watch with boards with weekdays, a violin received from a neighbor’s daughter, that Mana used as a guitar after the bow was destroyed in karate matches with her older brother. Mana says that she was badly scared when she saw her brother bleeding after she pushed him into a nightstand, being upset that he destroyed the bow of her violin. There was no day left from God that she was not beaten by parents or grandparents, for the fights she had with her older brother because she was so restless and full of energy.

Mana had health problems in childhood: frequent problems with the tonsils, mostly because she liked to eat pickled cucumber, her favourite food (she's alergic to pickled cucumber).

When she moved from the countryside to the city, she often fainted when she was located in closed spaces without sufficient air for a child grown up in the country, used to breathe fresh air.

At age of 12, she was close to drowning in the Bragadiru Lake, when she went to swim with a classmate and their parents. She was so scared and this experience determined her to became a better swimmer.
She hates hospitals and hospital atmosphere. She does not like to be hospitalized even she has health problems. Her mother, nurse by profession, thought it might be desirable to guide her to this profession or to pursue a college of medicine, but without any result.
Mana "Banana" (as the big brother called her in order to annoy her), felt even as a child that her way is another... the stage and the movie world.

She had to stop singing in the school’s choir in which she was singing.
In the fourth grade, she has been selected in the junior’s basketball team at “Rapid” Sports Club. It was not her preferred sport but she enjoyed to refuge in the school yard with the ball in one hand and practicing at the basket all day long.

She was forced to give up basketball in order to prepare for the high school. Back then basketball was her life and her air, no interest in mathematics… She liked to dream that one day she will be a star like Michael Jackson and Madonna.

When she went to her grandparents on vacation, she was climbing all the trees and doing a lot of funny things. In a winter, after the pig was butchered, she burned out of curiosity a bale of straw right in the pig’s house, now empty. It had to be rebuilt by her grandparents.

From her grandmother at the countryside, who took care of her from a small age, she has learned to sing, to sew, to tailor things, back then for the dolls. At present, she is the creator of the costumes for three theater performances and she also creates clothing for her as she wishes.

In high school, she has borrowed from a right-handed neighbor a guitar, to follow guitar training courses along with another colleague. Unfortunately for her, who is a left-handed person, she had to withdraw after a few months because her parents did not buy a guitar of her own to practice, as she wanted.

After that, she started training for Sport Aerobic Gymnastics with the Romanian Icar Team. She was so happy when she discovered in the rehearsal hall an old upright piano. She ussually came earlier in the rehearsal hall just for playing at piano. She liked to put her head on the upright piano and sang a sad song by her soul that led her to the world that she long dreamed of. Her colleagues for the team considered her a freak.

Passionate in martial arts, she has opted to practice multiple sports that develped her skills, dreaming that one day she will become a good actress and a famous singer.

Not encouraged by her family to pursue a theater and film university, she was enrolled in a sports university after finishing high school because this was what she known best - sports. In the final year she dropped the school sharply and went to take the examination at the University of Theater. She kept the secret, preparing for it all alone. The family found out only after she was admitted.

That was a time of true renaissance for Mana. It was in the end what she was looking for in a long time: her perfect “home” like she used to say. Elected Head of her class, and helped by her sports experience, she is helping to train her colleagues for the physical preparation, needed so much by an actor. The show and the stage are her life and her universe.

1996 - Mana climbed on the podium prize-winners at the first Aerobic Gymnastics Championship in Romania, being rewarded with the bronze medal.

2000 - Mana lost a silver medal at the National Fitness Championships. This happening broke her down emotionally. A mistake of the arbitration board made Mana to leave town right after the semifinals, because it was announced that she is not a finalist, but she knew what she was fighting for. After that mistake of arbitration board, Mana received a consolation diploma not being present at the finals, where she was found having scores for the 2nd place in the semifinal. After that, she continued to attend the championships, not for medals but to keep in contact with the stage for her dream of becoming an actress and singer.

In 2003, when she joined the second University, she left the competition stage in a state of advanced physical fatigue. The idea of being “number one” returned to her mind, on a background of chronic fatigue, over-training, and nutrition inadequate to the intense effort.

Totally reborn, Mana believes in that divine force that stretches a helping hand every time she needs it.

She likes to help her friends with what's best, but she hasn’t total confidence in them. From an early age, she grew up mostly among boys. She gets along better with them than the girls, feels very well surrounded by men, so she has not too many female friends. She had always been bored by women’s long discussions and small talk.


Preparing for the last Fitness Competitions 2003, she had the chance to meet a Stunt Team which has proposed her to prepare with them for their next film. The idea has delighted her. After a long and difficult road, all was leading to her dreams from childhood- movie world. But physical fatigue after the competitions held her away from the training room for a time, until she felt that she could train again and can accumulate new things.

With the first money earned as a Stunt Woman she started to invest in her musical training, the last link to her dream.

She has a pretty strange connection with the singer of traditional songs Ileana Sararoiu.
Although Mana was very little when Ileana Sararoiu died singing on the stage. Mana feels that this singer shepherded her steps in her career and she is a guiding in all she does. She claims that, thanks to a song of Ileana, she managed to impress the committee for admission to the Theater University.
Mana’s mother remained surprised that her daughter has begun to buy cassettes with just Ileana Sararoiu, that she was admiring being pregnant with Mana. She asked her, since when she knows about Ilena Sararoiu. Mana replied to her mother, that she loves her songs, although she never listened to her before then.

Now she feels that she has a task to accomplish for Ileana Sararoiu. And indeed, thanks to one of her songs that Mana likes to sing, she got a role in a Romanian TV Series for kids that is in production in 2009.