Several new plays of the Radu Stanca National Theatre
\nin Sibiu, presented these days in a short theatre season, have also been
\nincluded in the programme of the 24th Sibiu International Theatre
\nFestival.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Stage director Cristian Juncu, best known in Romania
\nmainly due to the contemporary plays he has worked on, is regarded as an expert
\nin Neil LaBute’s plays. Three of them, The Furies, Helter Skelter and
\nHappy Hour, were put together in the show Happy Holidays, staged at the
\ntheatre in Sibiu. The three short plays question the concept of
\nfaithfulness. Actress Ofelia Popii
\nfeatures in two of them. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Ofelia Popii: The texts take hold of you. You feel them
\nreally close. They have depth, but at the same time are somehow light. They’re
\neasy to perform. In the first story, my character is quite challenging in terms
\nof a different type of theatrical language that is used. I’m silent most of the
\ntimes, I just listen and react. Nevertheless, I must be very energetic,
\npresent, attentive and even incisive throughout the play, until the end when I
\nhave a monologue. The last part is quite different. It’s overwhelming, it’s
\ndemanding, a contemporary Medea. So the whole play has been a challenge. I
\nthink this is a very good play, very well thought, very well put together and
\nwe, the actors, feel great performing it.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Stage director Eugen Jebeleanu lives in Paris and his
\nprofessional life unfolds both in Romania and France. When directing a show, he
\nfocuses on analysing the individual’s identity in relation to society, to
\nhimself and to the people around him. He helps minority voices be heard, the
\nstories of the people who are usually ignored. The play Families was staged
\nin Sibiu with theatre students and started from the idea of doing something
\nthat speaks about actors. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Eugen Jebeleanu: I decided to write a play about them,
\nwhich I entitled Families. I wanted to look at the concept of family, to find
\nout what it means to them in today’s society, which its mechanisms are, and how
\nan individual’s identity is built in relation to this micro-society that is a
\nfamily. Hence, the multiple views. Of course, it was not my intention to come
\nup with solutions or to give verdicts. I only shed light on some questions,
\nsome problems and realities of the present.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The premieres of the Sibiu National Theatre also
\ninclude a musical, The Rocky Horror Show, staged by Cosmin Chivu, head of the
\nActing and Directing Department of Pace University in New York. The Rocky
\nHorror Show is a famous musical written by Richard O’Brien, which premiered in
\n1973 in London. A newly engaged couple on their way to their professor, reach
\nthe home of a mad scientist, Dr. Frank N. Furter, an alien from the planet
\nTranssexual, Transylvania. For the cast, Cosmin Chivu did not choose
\nprofessional actors, but third-year and post-graduate students, who, he says,
\nare crazy enough to do new things and have extraordinary potential for
\nplaying in a musical. Cosmin Chivu told us about the challenges of working on
\nthe Rocky Horror Show.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Cosmin Chivu: Finding a middle way, finding a creative
\nsolution, preserving the sophisticated elements of the show without getting
\ninto what might be defined as prejudiced. I believe the story is very
\ninteresting. This is a comedy. So I think the most important thing is to allow
\nthe audience to laugh, to not take things very seriously. This was one of the
\nmost important things we had to discover and put together during rehearsals. We
\ndidn’t focus too much on how this would have been staged somewhere else, in the
\nUS or in London, where this musical was created. We tried to give it a local
\nflavour, to bring it to our part of the world a little, without any compromise
\nand without questioning its artistic value in any way.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Gianina Carbunariu’s
\nSprechen Sie Schweigen? (Do you speak Silence) is a show co-produced by the
\nRomanian and German sections of the Radu Stanca National Theatre within the
\nHuman Trade Network. The project is made jointly with artists from Germany,
\nIndia and Burkina Faso, at the invitation of German director Clemens Bechtel.
\nGianina Carbunariu has chosen the theme of labour outsourcing, inspired by a
\nprotest put up by the Romanian workers at the Mall of Berlin – Mall of Shame, a
\ncase given extensive media coverage in 2014. The authorities responded with
\nsilence. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Gianina Carbunariu: This
\nmechanism of silence interested me very much. It’s all about the silence of the
\nworkers, those who had to put up with situations like these and chose not to
\nspeak about them because they knew they were not going to get help either from
\nthe Romanian state or from the German one. On the other hand, it’s also about
\nthis ear-splitting silence from both the Romanian and German authorities.
\nFurthermore, because I was working with this team from Sibiu, it was all very
\npersonal because many of them had relatives working abroad. We also had these
\ntwo actors who came from Germany to Sibiu to play their parts in the show. And
\nthus the topic has been defined by this experience of our joint efforts,
\nRomanians, Germans, Hungarians. And this seems very important to me. It’s not a
\nshow about outsourcing the workforce, it’s about the dreams we all have, about
\nwhat we owe to these people who risk their lives and health to work abroad.
\nThere is a touching moment when an actress says, during the show: Mom took
\ncare of old people in Germany to keep me and my brother in college. The fact
\nthat I am on stage performing tonight is also thanks to her work.<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Sprechen Sie Schweigen will be performed in Freiburg
\nin June. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Several new plays of the Radu Stanca National Theatre in Sibiu, presented these days in a short theatre season, have also been included in the programme of the 24th Sibiu International Theatre Festival.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":129,"featured_media":161506,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[44685],"tags":[44849,44851,44779,44852,44850,44853],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-161505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-of-culture","tag-radu-stanca-national-theatre","tag-cosmin-chivu","tag-eugen-jebeleanu","tag-gianina-crabunariu","tag-ofelia-popii","tag-the-24th-international-theatre-festival"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n