Hotel Dallas (Romania/USA, 2016), the film debut of Livia Ungur and Sherng-Lee Huang, will screen in the Panorama Documents section of this year’s Berlinale. The film will celebrate its world premiere on February 15^th at 5:30 pm in Cinestar 7.

Directors: Livia Ungur and Sherng-Lee Huang
Cast: Patrick Duffy, Livia Ungur, Sherng-Lee Huang, and others
Romania / USA, 2016, 75 min

SCREENING DATES

WORLD PREMIERE / press screening: Monday, February 15th at 5:30 pm, Cinestar 7

Further screenings:
Tuesday, February 16th, 10:30 pm, Cinestar 7
Wednesday, February 17th, 2:30 pm, Colosseum 1
Saturday, February 20th, 8 pm, Cinestar 7

The directors will be available for interviews during the festival

Playfully mixing fiction and documentary, the filmmakers explore the influence of a TV show on a society in upheaval. The film takes Patrick Duffy, star of the American TV series Dallas, on a magical mystery tour of Romania, from the communist 80s into the present.  

The film
In the 80s, in the twilight of communist Romania, Dallas is the only American show on TV. Presented as a cautionary tale about the evils of capitalism, the show captures the imagination of millions. Among them are Ilie and his daughter Livia. He is a small-time criminal and aspiring capitalist; she is in love with the show’s handsome leading man, Patrick Duffy. After communism falls, Ilie builds the Hotel Dallas, a life-size copy of the Dallas mansion. Livia immigrates to America, becomes an artist, and directs a film starring Patrick Duffy, as a soap opera character who dies in Texas and wakes up in Romania, in a hotel that looks just like home. 

The directors
Ungur & Huang is a wife-and-husband artist duo, working in video, sculpture, installation and performance. Hotel Dallas is their first feature. Livia Ungur was born in communist Romania; she immigrated to America to study art, graduating from the Yale School of Art. Sherng-Lee Huang grew up in Tennessee and is currently a video editor for The Huffington Post. They have previously exhibited at the National Gallery of Art in D.C., the Stavros Niarchos Center in Greece, and the National Library in Buenos Aires. They live in Brooklyn, New York.