From Russia with love ‘ADVENTURE’S IN MY BLOOD’
Victoria’s glad she took the leap of faith, even though it was a desperate act
Victoria Haralabidou understands what it means to be different. A natural adventurer, the Russian-born actor is quirky and funny, and when the Weekly caught up with her at her Gold Coast home to talk about filming in New Zealand for her latest movie The Moon is Upside Down, her energy is infectious as she relays the story of her unconventional journey to stardom.
Born in Leningrad – now Saint Petersburg – Victoria grew up in communist Russia, under the rule of Brezhnev and Gorbachev. Lessons included how to use a firearm aged seven and how to hide under tables in case of attack.
“It was all about war in the ’80s,” explains Victoria, who moved to Australia in 2005. “I see the horror in people’s eyes when I tell them. It sounds extraordinary, but that was my normal – I didn’t know any different.
“We’d line up to get food, which was handed over when it was your turn. If we lined up for cheese, we’d get cheese. It wasn’t until we moved to Greece when I was 15 that I learned there were other cheeses! To me, it was just cheese.”
While Victoria now understands her parents, a mechanical engineer and a doctor, left Russia “for a better life”, moving to Greece as a teen was tough.
“I didn’t know the language or how to behave,” she tells. “It was like having one foot in each culture – in Russia you’re Greek and in Greece you’re Russian.”
However, she admits she was “very dramatic” during her teenage years and she doesn’t like dwelling on some of her past “because when I think about them, they play on loop in my head. Looking back, I realise how badly it could have gone. Like – what was I thinking?!”
Victoria’s history, she says, is complicated.
“My grandfather was from Albania, my mother comes from a family of Greek political immigrants and was born in Romania, while her parents were travelling to the Soviet Union. Their stories instilled in me a sense of adventure that’s in my blood. I choose to celebrate that.”
Victoria is happily married to her Canberraborn husband, with a child – both of whom she keeps out of the limelight. She has now carved out a successful acting career, recently starring in the 2022 action drama The Tourist alongside Jamie Dornan – and life today is vastly different to her Russian childhood.
“Moving countries, then marrying an Australian and moving here has been an emotional journey,” she shares. “The despair at points and the isolation I have felt is real.
“But like my parents and grandparents, I take leaps without really thinking about them. My 90-year-old grandfather still doesn’t know where I am – he thinks I’m in Austria and I don’t have the heart to tell him that it’s Australia, even further away!”
She’d better not tell him, then, how much she loved filming in New Zealand.
“Kiwis have the best sense of humour,” she says. “You don’t take yourself too seriously and I love that.”
The Moon is Upside Down is a black comedy, written and directed by Eagle vs Shark leading lady Loren Taylor, co-starring acclaimed Kiwi actors Robyn Malcolm, Jemaine Clement and Robbie Magasiva. Victoria plays Siberian mail-order bride Natalia, who comes to Aotearoa believing she’ll achieve her dream of running a café with her new husband Macintosh, played by Flight of the Conchords star Jemaine. Naturally, things don’t go to plan, and Natalia soon discovers that Macintosh and his sister Hilary, played by Robyn, are hiding some big secrets.
Filming didn’t go smoothly, with Covid putting the country into lockdown.
“I arrived the day New Zealand shut its borders, so I went into quarantine, blu-tacked my script to my hotel room walls for two weeks and learned it,” explains Victoria. “I also walked 15 kilometres in the tiny garden listening to the story on my phone.
“After quarantine, I think I visited every op shop in Wellington and I’m still hooked on the gluten-free ku¯mara sourdough I found! Food and music – that’s how I explored the city.”
And during filming, the 52-year-old found she has a lot in common with her character.
“It takes courage and risk to change,” she says. “Travel through desperation – that’s part of Natalia’s story and mine. That glorious risk.
I’m glad I took the risk to move and start over again.”
The Moon is Upside Down is now screening in selected cinemas nationwide.
‘The despair at points and the isolation I have felt is real’