Iva Babić’s latest role, as the female lead in The Machine, highlights her comedic and dramatic talents. Legendary Pictures’ The Machine opened Memorial Day weekend, 2023, via Sony Pictures Releasing. The raucous comedy, directed by Peter Atencio (Key & Peele), tells the hit viral story of stand-up comedian Bert Kreischer and his brush with the Russian Mafia as a 21-year-old student on a semester abroad in Moscow. The Machine features Star Wars alum Mark Hamill as Kreischer’s father. Iva plays the daughter of the ruling Mafia boss, and the role highlights her athletic stunt work in addition to a compelling performance.
Born in Croatia, Iva has appeared in both English-language as well as projects in several other languages. Her recent English-language projects include Alan Ball’s Virtuoso for HBO (2015), and The Romanoffs, Matthew Weiner’s Amazon series (2018).
Iva studied at the Academy of Arts and Drama in Zagreb. Director Branko Schmidt cast her in his films Metastases (2009) and Vegetarian Cannibal (2012). Her breakthrough, however, came with the series Sunday Mornings, Saturday Nights (2012), for which she was widely praised. Her burgeoning acting skills were next put to the test in the Croatian version of the renowned US/Israeli TV series In Treatment (2013), for which she won Best Actress in a TV series. Her first major role as a lead in a theatrical film came in 2014 with the suspense drama One Shot, playing a young woman who kills an innocent passer-by in a shooting accident.
She has since worked with some of the most renowned directors in Croatia, such as Antonio Nuić in his dramedy Life is a Trumpet (2015), Lukas Nola’s spy thriller Guardian of the Castle (2017) and Vinko Brešan’s Perica’s Diary (2021) where she showed her musical talents and skills such as singing, dancing, playing piano and her ability to do different accents. The series won numerous awards and is loved by audiences and critics.
