78 Years of Puppet Theater

The Tăndărică Puppet and Marionette Theater was founded in 1945

Ana-Maria Cononovici, 23.11.2023, 18:13

The Tăndărică Puppet and Marionette Theater was founded in 1945, and its first section, the marionette section, was led by actress Lucia Calomeri, assisted by stage designers Elena Pătrăşcanu, Alexandru Brătăşanu, Lena Constante and Ileana Popescu. In 1949, Margareta Niculescu, the new director of the institution, laid the foundations of the theaters puppet section.

Many big name directors, known from the stages of ordinary theaters or from cinematography, have staged here, among them: Radu Penciulescu, Silviu Purcărete, Cătălina Buzoianu, Cristian Pepino, Victor Ioan Frunză, Ildiko Kovacs, Irina Niculescu, Felix Alexa, Ion Caramitru, etc.

Having reached 78 years in age, the Ţăndărică Animation Theater celebrated with the “ImPuls Ţăndărică Anniversary Gala”, held in the first part of November. Miruna Simian, artistic consultant for the Ţăndărică Theatre, told us:

“After a four-year break, we have the “ImPuls Ţăndărică Anniversary Gala”, a festival-type contest event, with guests from the country and abroad, with a theater section for teenagers and dedicated to teenagers, book launches, we will also play in hospitals, (n.r. where there will be) some animated theater moments. There are many events during this anniversary Gala.”

In order to reach as many age groups as possible, performances with and about teenagers were also held during the Gala. Here is Miruna Simian:

“There are three troupes of teenagers: one troupe, the Contrapunct Theater Academy, which presents a show with an anti-drug theme, we also have the students from the Spiru Haret National College, with “The Bald Singer”, which was the winning project in the Bucharest High School Theater Voice Festival, a theater competition festival for teenagers, and students from the Spiru Haret National College were coordinated by the Ţăndărică Theatre team. There will also be the Victory of Art Theater Company, with which we have a permanent collaboration, hosting, with the show “The Lesson”. It is theater performed by teenagers, dedicated to teenagers.”

And because we found out that book launches were also scheduled, we asked our interlocutor with whom they had a partnership:

“With the Corinth publishing house and with Curtea Veche Publishing. We will have book presentations for children, teenagers and parenting, because they sum up the categories of public that we address. Every day we have book presentations or workshops in this sense, starting from certain titles of the publishing houses that I mentioned.”

Miruna Simian told us how the Ţăndărică Theatre manages to still be young at 78 years old:

” By researching! A lot of research is behind the entire team of the Ţăndărică Theatre. We are always aware of everything new in the field, we try to apply, to adapt ourselves to the needs of todays children, to adapt values to new types of education. We are in a continuous (n.r. search), because we have to be one step ahead of all trends, to be able to express ourselves in a language that can be easily understood by children. Todays children are much more agile, much more hurried, maybe with a little less patience, everything has to happen at a much more alert pace in order not to lose interest. We also try to integrate elements of technology, to a lesser extent, but still to attract them to our shows. We are talking about types of light design, mapping, intermapping, these are future projects. We adapt our language to todays children. We are looking for contemporary values that are important to the children of 2023.”

The theater has consolidated a repertory strategy at the content level, a portfolio of titles from the great classics of Romanian and universal literature: Păcală, The Goat with Three Kids, Puss in Boots, Baron Münchausen, Three Little Pigs, Snow White. Another coordinate of the managerial strategy is supporting the artistic debuts of young creative actors, directors, set designers, composers, choreographers, etc. In a desire to attract the adult audience as well, an experimental studio “AnimArt” was created, where pieces from the classical repertoire, such as Faust, Candide, etc., are played, loosely adapted from the works of the same name. Miruna Simian also told us about the shows that adults are waiting for:

“We also have some puppet shows for adults, “The King Dies”, by Matei Vişniec, and Migraaants!. It is played quite rarely at festivals and at special events, such as galas. “The King Dies”, directed by Eliza Păuna, was a winner in a competition for young creators in the field of animation theater, and won prizes at almost all the major festivals it participated in.”

The theater is constantly rewarded with prestigious prizes at national and international competitions.