Viire Valdma

Viire Valdma (born 29 August 1960) is an Estonian stage, television and film actress. Early life and education Viire Valdma was born in the port town of Paldiski in Harju County. She has two sisters and a half-sister from her mother's second marriage after her parents divorced. The family was forced to move when Paldiski became a heavily fortified closed city after a Soviet Navy nuclear submarine training centre was constructed in 1962. Valdma is a 1982 graduate of the Tallinn State Conservatory (now, the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre) in Tallinn, having studied acting under instructor Aarne Üksküla. Among her graduating classmates were Anu Lamp, Margus Oopkaup, Jaan Rekkor, Laine Mägi, Sulev Teppart, and Andrus Vaarik. Stage career In 1982, shortly after graduation, Viire Valdma began an engagement at the Vanalinnastuudio (Old Town Studio theatre) in Tallinn. She would remain with at the Vanalinnastuudio until 1996. She made her debut at the theatre in role of Alvetina Ivanova in a production of the Semyon Zlotnikov play A Man Came To A Woman in 1982. During her years at the Vanalinnastuudio she would appear in roles in productions of works by such authors and playwrights as: Shakespeare, Eduardo De Filippo, Oskar Luts, August Strindberg, Joseph Kesselring, Jean Genet, Félicien Marceau, Achille Campanile, Sławomir Mrożek, Johnnie Mortimer and Brian Cooke, Willy Russell, Neil Simon, George Gershwin, Ray Cooney, and Marc Camoletti, among others.