Macbeth-Inspired 'Fadia' Wins Monte-Carlo Golden Nymph
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- Shady Srour, a Palestinian-Israeli filmmaker based in Nazareth, created the mini-series "Fadia" after extensive research including conversations with women "with horror stories," aided by his wife, a social worker who has worked with rape survivors.
- "Fadia" airs on Israeli-Arab language network Makan TV under producer Cinema Virgin, with Yara Elham Jarrar starring as a woman abandoned by family in an honor killing but rescued by neighbors who risk everything to keep her safe.
- "Fadia" took home five awards across the Monte-Carlo TV Festival and the Haifa International Film Festival, including the coveted Golden Nymph at Monte-Carlo, where Srour shared a stage with Lesley Manville.
- Srour initially planned a documentary on honor killings before pivoting to a thriller mini-series he felt would reach a bigger audience, writing long monologues inspired by Shakespeare that audiences and juries reportedly responded to emotionally.
- Srour flags that putting "Palestine and Israel" next to each other in a single project now draws threats from the Israeli government and extremists who he says are pressuring to cut his funding.
- Srour complicates his own subject by noting the "vast majority of femicides are not honor killings" and that such killings also occur in the U.S., UK, Germany and beyond, not only the Middle East.
- Srour describes Arabs as roughly 20% of Israel's population and frames his work as self-examination under "different shapes of occupation," whether inside Israel, the West Bank, or Gaza.
Why it matters: The Golden Nymph win delivers international visibility to a Palestinian-Israeli co-identity project that Srour explicitly says is facing funding pressure from the Israeli government and extremists. For Arab-Israeli creators, the festival sweep demonstrates that socially conservative, female-violence-centered programming can clear Europe's top juries — proof of concept that this type of work travels when institutional backing at home is shaky.
