“Your Bed’s Been Stolen”/ Vi s-a furat un pat

The performance was Valentin Nicolau’s stage debut as playwright. The performance was staged by the above-mentioned theatre in 1998-1999.

Director and costume designer: Emil Mândru

Music: Nicu Alifantis

Casting:

The Gentleman – Constantin Petrican

The Actor / the Tramp – Virgil Leahu

The Teacher – Eudoxia Volbea

The Carpenter– Vasile Mălinescu

The Fireman– Florin Predună

She – Ozana Ciubotaru Costin

He– Cristi Costin

The Young Woman – Otilia Huzum

Johnny – Constantin Băcică

„It was more than a pleasant surprise for me to learn that Valentin Nicolau, a very good editor, a very good producer, a very good geologist and a very good publishing house owner should come up in front of my eyes as a very good playwright as well. The main issue in the play is the violence we are subject to each and every day because of the media, because of second-hand journalists and politicians. The author pleads for the family and the couple, as spaced where you can rediscover yourself, given the troubles times we live in.” (Nicu Alifantis, Revista As)

„I am glad to witness the promising debut of Valentin Nicolau the writer. The play which is now a performance for the first time is a text for the present day, a harsh and brave metaphor that sanctions the “social evil” and mocks at politics and demagogy at hard transition times.” (Actor Vasile Mălinescu in the hall programme)

“Pleasure Factory”/ Uzina de plăceri S.A.

The premiere took place on the 16^th of October 2002 in the Nottara Theatre, Bucharest. It is based on the play titled “Like Snow White and the Two”, winner of the Great Prize of the Camil Petrescu National Playwriting competition in 2000. Stage director Alexandru Berceanu was awarded the young creators’ prize by the Romanian Ministry of Culture and Religious Cults in 2003 for this production.

The performance was invited to the 2003 edition of FestCo (Romanian Comedy Festival). It was also presented during the 14^th edition of the Contemporary Playwriting Festival in Brasov, where main actor Virgil Ogăşanu was awarded the best actor prize. It was attended the Comedy Festival in Galaţi, where the same actor playing the Old Man was awarded the best actor prize once more.

You can still see the performance, for it still is the repertoire of the above-mentioned theatre.

Stage Director: Alexandru Berceanu

Costumes: Ina Isbăşescu

Casting:

The Old Man: Virgil Ogăşanu

The Tenant: Lucian Ghimişi / Dan Bordeianu

The Phone Operator: Crenguţa Hariton

„The play lacks any political subtext and it can bee seen as a poetical comedy that proves the playwright’s skill in theatrical convention and character building. The theme is both simple and striking, but this is not the most important aspect. What matters most, is the subtle humour and sadness, the exuberance and the lyricism endowing the play with particular charm. In an apartment full of pieces of old furniture, there live an old man and his habits, the same every day. He talks to his tom-cat and to his books, he encourages himself every morning by saying “I’m in such a good shape”, he goes to the graveyard to pay visits not only to the tombs of his relatives and friends, but also t his own tomb, from which the date of his death is the only thing missing. (…) This performance staged in a hall as intimate as The Studio, housed by the Nottara Theatre, is sure to make an offer to be appreciated by that audience longing for pieces of true life, but also for metaphors. The play proves a call for theatre, just as it expresses the author’s poetical sense and sense of humour too. Most of it is static, for it is about inner conflicts. (…)” (Eugen Comarnescu, „Surprise Playwright”, in Cronica română, October 22, 2002)

„ (…) Each and every morning an old man deceiving himself, thinking that it is the beginning of a better and more beautiful day. He longs for some conversation until one day when his dull life is troubled by an unknown person who becomes his tenant. He takes the name of the owner’s cat and he plays the professional winner wishing to overcome an illness deriving from poverty: the Bingo-mania that has seized Romanians. Then there comes a hotline professional, an innocent girl, with a trauma from her childhood, determined to hide, but also to make a revenge by phone. The three characters share moments of ordinary joy as well as moment of stupid harassment, getting involved in a game of well-tempered ambiguity (played on a carefully selected music column). This sanctions the fake (and the slogan!) life, just as it sanctions self-delusion and the solitude anxiety. It culminates in an open denouement, which can also be interpreted as an abstract, still credible solution, which is no less exciting. (Irina Coroiu, „3 Valentin Nicolau”, Contemporanul, no. 1-4, January 2003)

„I was ready and enthusiastically ready to write a review of a play/performance I enjoyed (is this something to be ashamed of?) a lot: “Pleasure Factory”, based on the play written by Valentin Nicolau. I saw it at the Nottara Theatre last Saturday, a few days ago. The playwright is better known as the ‘boss’ of Nemira Publishing House, a true success in the last 16 years. He is also known as a former president of the Romanian Public Television Network. And if people talk nice of you are ‘boss’ no longer, this is sure to be something, since we live in a world divided between ‘ours’ and ‘theirs’. (…) But they miss the essential for a man’s profile. Valentin Nicolau, who looks both gloomy and threatening (the famous violin player David Oistrach embodied the same contradiction between the physical and the metaphysical), is a remarkable playwright indeed! Not only because he was praised by a Romanian literary critic as notorious as Nicolae Manolescu when he made his debut with a collection of plays and due to some prized warded by the Romanian Association of Theatre Artists and the Romanian Ministry of Culture. He is a remarkable playwright simply because his plays are readable. And now they have made it on stage. I didn’t see “The Legend of the Last Emperor” directed by Alice Barb and staged by the National Theatre in Bucharest and I have neither seen his other plays staged in theatres in other Romanian cities. I just read them before being published and I bet on them. And I am glad that the author has been confirmed by other ‘sources’ too.

The play staged at the Nottara Theatre has turned into a coherent and – absurdly – romantic performance, a lyrical production with respect for the classical theatre-making craft, endowed with ideas, substance and tension. The dialogue and the humorous absurd of the situations taken from contemporary life, which we too live in, are masterfully rendered and used by a stage director as young as Alexandru Berceanu and also by the actors: the much experienced Virgil Ogaşanu and Crenguţa Hariton, proving herself a very gifted actress. The performance has got rhythm, the dialogue is charming and the costumes authored by Inei Isbăşescu suggest the so dear universe of our daily dirt. The one we treat with mild irony: now with fury, then with acceptance. We are uncomplaining – both yes and no. We harbor lots of illusions: yes and no. Even so: yes and no. Why? Because this is how the story goes. This is it. (…) The play and the aspiration continue after the curtain falls on stage. We don’t know if Valentin Nicolau (…) can turn into a top playwright, but he surely seems to. And we wish him not to give up playwriting. (…)!” (Bedros Horasangian, “Pleasure Factory at Nottara”, Ziua, July 4, 2006)

The Last Emperor (Ultimul Împărat)

The show was on stage in 2002-2003. The first performance was held on the 26th of October 2002, once with the opening of the new theatre hall.

Stage direction, light design and music:Vitalie Lupaşcu

Costumes: Vioara Bara (The National Theatre in Oradea)

Choreography: Mihaela Dinu

Casting:

His Majesty – Marian Negrescu

The General (The Marshall) – Constantin Eremia

The Adviser – Valeriu Bâzu

The High Priest (The Hermit) – Ionuţ Stoica

The Jester – Eugen Titu

The Courtesan – Mariana Ghiţulescu

The Photographer – Ion Alexandrescu

The Cook – Simona Urs

The Bear – Monica Sfetcu & Rodica Gugu

Courtiers, guards, servants, crowd and barbarians: Dan Dobroiu, Sorin Giurca, George Drăghescu

“Last Stop in Paradise”/ Ultima haltă în paradis

Director Alexandru Tociescu staged the play for the Romanian Public Television staged the play in 2002. The production was presented one year later in the 13^th edition of the I.L. Caragiale National Theatre Festival, in the TV Theatre section. Later on it became a “best TV theatre production” nominee to the prizes awarded by the Romanian Association of Theatre Artists.

Directed and adapted by Alexandru Tocilescu

Edited by Doina Teodoru

Costumes: Ion Olaru

Casting:

Mitică – Florin Piersic

The nurse – Mariana Dănescu

The doctor – Florina Cercel

Ionel – George Ivaşcu

Luminiţa Erga, Mirela Oprişor, Oana Tatu, Georgiana Purcaru, Luminiţa Roşu

„I have said it on and on that I not even interested in texts awarded in competitions, unless they make me feel like turning them in performances. And I am saying it with all the moral authority of a stage director which a long career, half of it meaning staging of Romanian plays. The truth it, I admit, that I staged poor plays too, but I no longer want to save such texts. Playwrights must save themselves by writing truly challenging plays. I read the text by Valentin Nicolau and I thought it was very well written. Some of it reminded by of the liveliness and charm of the plays authored by Tudor Popescu. There are lively and colorful characters who bring life on stage. This is why I asked the actors and the TV production team as well to focus on what is true and natural, on life seen from close, like in a documentary. I left them enough room for improvisation, for the sake of the natural, so that we could avoid pre-established things and fakes. This is better for the rhythm too and for the tension in a performance. (Director Alexandru Tocilescu interviewed by Ioan Parhon, România liberă, October 3, 2002)

„One force of nature gets unbound in Studio 1 of the Romanian television, it dances, it struggles and it plays with a frail young man, scared of what is happening to him. Somewhere behind on a wheelchair there sits the owner of two lively eyes carefully watching, unable to hold back his smile. This stage was played in all truth, expressing more tension than I managed to describe. It happened last Wednesday afternoon in the place mentioned above. The TV team is working hard at the making of the first TV theatre production after five long years. We can call this an event. This is the first time when Alexandru Tocilescu, undeniable a top stage director in Romania, is making a TV theatre production, staging “The Last Stop in Paradise” by Valentin Nicolau. It is also the first time when the director is working with a great Romanian actor who hasn’t been playing for years now, that is Florin Piersic. (…) He is the force I have just mentioned above, he has missed playing theatre so much that you have the impression that he can move mountains if the director asks him to give it some of his fullness. Therefore the hospital ward represented in the studio by designer Ion Olaru is just a piece of cake for him. But for the time being he is teaching his ward made how to dance. (…) The National Television Theatre is standing all chances to hit the jackpot this fall to come up with a real pick both for the audience, who is longing for true TV performances by remarkable artists, and for theatre experts.(Fragment from “Alexandru Tocilescu and Florin Piersic make a ‘stop’ in Romanian Television”, Adevărul, September 14, 2002)

„This play is a genuine remake of the Don Juan myth against the background which the city of Bucharest offers. Don Juan is now embodied in the person of Mitica, who is the expression of some local habits. As for the background, it is genuine too, legendary too and it bears an inviting philosophical dimension. This is the metaphor of a wearied space, for here Mitica experiences the remembrance of his fame and also a new beginning. This is done through the transfer of his experiences onto a possible future disciple. This original Sganarel who accompanies Don Juan here is some common Johnny, eager to learn the art of seduction and the way to success from his master. The love initiation ritual is thus turned into a touching lesson on and for life, which the old man transfers onto the youngster, together with his uncommon vital energy.

Apart from the complex portraying of the two, we can notice a ceaseless oscillation between the tragic and the comic, which makes an important dimension of the text. Humorously and cheerfully, Mitica and Ionel fancy enthralling love affairs, but these are always shadowed by tragic illusions. Life itself is a charming illusion. But death, which is approaching the aged Don Juan, is painfully true. (…)

As for the excellent team mentioned above, the first to be remarked is stage director Alexandru Tocilescu. And this is due not only to the fact that this is his first television experience, in which he is proving as masterful as on stage, but also to his exceptional artistic spirit, which makes an admirable subtle and poetical performance. (…) And due to actor Florin Piersic we forget that this is about some common bacchanal, about some nice womanizer, and we get to pay attention to his inner world, to his vast life experience, which has now reached the time for confessions, as the other life is drawing near.” (Doina Papp, TV Theatre Premieres, November 19, 2002)

“Last Stop in Paradise”/ Ultima haltă în Paradis

The performance was part of the 2003 – 2003 repertoire of  North Theatre, Satu Mare, Romania. The premiere took place on the 9^th of February 2003, shortly after the release of the TV version of the same play. The jury made up of theatre critics such as Alice Georgescu, Cristina Modreanu and Ion Parhon selected this production for the 2^nd edition of FestCo (The Romanian Comedy Festival) in 2004.

Stage direction: Andrei Mihalache

Costumes: Alexandru Radu

Choreography: Gabriela Tănase

Casting:

Mitică – Radu Botar

Ionel – Ciprian Vultur

The doctor – Paula Chirilă

The nurse – Dana Moisuc

The brown-haired woman – Ortansa Codreanu

The red-haired woman – Gabriela Dorgai

The fair-haired woman – Carmen Frăţilă

Valentin Nicolau interviewed before the premiere (fragment excerpted from the brochure of the performance meant for the audience)

Which is the first thing that comes in your mind when I say „Satu Mare”?

Satu Mare was my first destination as a geophysicist specializing in prospecting, at the time when I got a job in engineering after graduating university. In September 1985, I took a bus from Satu Mare to Negresti, Oas, an area under geological prospecting. I can still remember, as clear as daylight, that when I got off the bus, there was a poster on the wall of the building next to the bus station announcing “The Poor Millionaire”, a performance based on Tudor Popescu’s play. Years later, Tudor Popescu was the man who encouraged me to subscribe my first play and even more, he mad me confident and hopeful so that I would go on writing plays.

This premier follows shortly after the release of the TV production based on the same play. What are your expectations from this stage performance?

The TV production by director Alexandru Tocilescu got huge feedback. It also saw the comeback of Florin Piersic, a great actor. But theatre involves stage, audience and relating. I can’t speak of expectations, but just of the emotion I feel.

How does on perceive the theatre in the province from Bucharest, the capital city of Romania?

The world of province is sometimes loaded with pejorative connotations. But I am not one of those who make such associations, for I have seen extraordinary performances in many theatres in the country. This is why I take this as a matter of geography, not as one of value in the world of arts. There is also the fact that in many theatres in Bucharest one can see a lot of “provincial” performances. The value of a performance does not depend on the geographical position of the place where it is staged. If there is a problem, that problem consists in the fact that the productions of theatres in other Romanian cities than Bucharest are shown in the capital too rarely.

What is your opinion on the so-called shortage of Romanian playwrights at the moment?

This goes for the entire Romanian literature in the contemporary society, in relation to readers’ expectations. As for playwrights, plays make a difficult genre for writers. It has got specific requirements and it has a potential to disappoint writers, since theatre is a form of art involving intermediaries. As for who is at fault for a possible failure, this is hard to say. There are few stage performances to start from the plays that are being written at present, in fact. Stage directors and theatre presidents are at fault as far as this is concerned, for they prefer filling their CVs with names of classical playwrights, for they can no longer and they can no longer see their works modified (adapted). And they can no longer make financial claims. I think those who bet on the high quality contemporary plays, as many as we have got at present, can win the bet made with the audience.  (Gabriela Şimon)

“Oh, World, Vain World…”/ Lume, lume, soro lume…

Play reading in the International Theatre Festival Sibiu 2000

“The Secret of Angels”/ Taina îngerilor

Play reading in the International Theatre Festival Sibiu 2008

“The Legend of the Last Emperor”/ Legenda ultimului imparat

The performance was on show in 2002-2003. The premiere took place on the 10th of October 2002. The staging was based on a version of The Photographer of His Majesty (The Last Emperor), written by the playwright himself. The initial play is included in a collection of plays titled The Last Emperor and published by Polirom Publishing House. In 2003 the performance was presented in the 10th edition of the International Theatre Festival held in Sibiu.

Stage direction and music: Alice Barb

Costumes and light design: Cătălin I. Arbore

Choreography: Roxana Colceag

Casting:

His Majesty – Claudiu Bleonţ

The Fool – George Ivaşcu

The General – Mircea Albulescu

The High Priest – Ion Lucian

The Adviser – Constantin Dinulescu

The Cook – Rodica Popescu Bitănescu

The Courtesan – Ilinca Goia

The Mother Queen– Carmen Ionescu

Courtier – Mihai Perşa

The Galloper– Ioan Andrei Ionescu

The Photographer – Georgian Ilie

The Beggar – Sorin Sandu

„The play starts from an authentic legend which Caligula voices. This legend has it that someday there will be a last emperor. He will conquer the whole world and foretell the second coming of Jesus. The authors endow the theme with an apocalyptic dimension and he approaches all the main issues of the 20th century and he establishes various relations among them.” Director Alice Barb

„Valentin Nicolau’s spirit of venture is hopeless. It kept him alive before 1989, making him richer in a certain sense of the word, it gave him strength and boldness after the Romanian Revolution when he founded Nemira, the publishing house he owns, and when he ran across new voices and new and challenging worlds, as provocative as the structure of his own self. Although dull and little lively, he is the possessor of many special experiences, he has roamed about all the corners and the high class salons to see man in a variety of hyposthasis, situations, lights and shadows, with dazzling glows and with a stunning stench of putrefaction. Step by step, such images began coming out of his mind, allowing him to put them down. This is how his plays were born. They came to life naturally, without needing a caesarian operation. They were doomed to be so: feverish, agile, with skilled dialogue, with love for stage. (…) You have a charming, subtle and multi-layer story on the one hand, a story told in the language of poetry. And you have the forms of pathological sheltered in the mind of a dictator, on the other hand. “The action takes place in the palaces of the powerful, where every instant is history and it must be photographed to last in eternity”, says the playwright. What he does not say is the amazing truth that his Majesty is growing. His crown is too tight, his shoes and clothes are too small, just like his bad, the throne hall has grown smaller and the palace itself is diminishing. Power doesn’t suit him any more, power is growing too small for him.” (…) (Marina Constantinescu, Pinocchio’s Nose, text printed on the brochure the audience could buy when going to see the play)

“The Legend of the Last Emperor is a step taken to the world of philosophical parables and to the realm of the tragic-comical, that realm where the classical themes of universal dramaturgy meet. Some critics have hastily focused on the Shakespearian king-fool relation and on the wise, but sad fool. Others have found even more similarities, some with the works of Alfred Jarry and Evgheni Shvartz or even with the plays written by Vasile Alecsandri, an early 19^th century Romanian playwright. Such comparisons are surely harmless. If we consider the relation between the tyrant and his people or the grotesque image of Totalitarianism which the play conveys, this text may very well resemble some brisky plays by Teodor Mazilu, 20^th century Romanian playwright. As far as the relation between man (king, fool or ordinary man) and God is concerned, we can decipher some of the dramatic questions that the Russian mystics used to ask or some of the existentialists’ “negations”. But I am afraid that if we take this way we shall end up in wronging the play, that is The Legend of the Last Emperor. Apart from its obvious elitist dimension, it is a work of undisputable autonomy in structure and significance. It gives both stage directors and actors a chance to make a modern and attractive fulfillment on stage.(…)” (Ion Parhon, „Autumn Sees Premiere Harvest”, România liberă, October 17, 2002)

„The Legend of the Last Emperor staged by the National Theatre in Bucharest is sure to be one of the best performances of the last two-three years. Why such success in Romanian theatre? This is the question I am trying to answer in this review. One reason is the elite casting, no doubt about it. Another reason is the fact that is a skilled play, with masterful dialogues (and especially with the main character’s monologues on God, faith and power) that resound like wisdom literature, this way resembling no other play in contemporary Romania. Just like in his other plays (mainly The Ghost from the First Class Waiting Room), Valentin Nicolau is obviously interested in the significance of Romanian Totalitarianism, which he himself wet through, both as writer and s victim, but on this play things are given an artistic touch that dwindles the so-called “Romanian specificity” to develop upon the maddening power, which makes the dictator feel no more and no less than the son of God, born by Virgin Mary. (…) More than when read, when staged The Legend of the Last Emperor resembles Ionesco’s “The King Dies” more than we’ve thought. What these two have in common is the same pattern of a cruel fairy tale for the grown-ups. But it is not this death of man, of civilization, of the world that the author decries. What is decries instead is the death of God due to the vanity of man. (…)” (Mircea Ghiţulescu, Legenda ultimului împărat, Curentul, January 11, 2003)

„Imagine a chessboard as big as the world, on which the black and white squares are next to teach other, just like the happenings in life – we get good ones, we get bad ones. It is in this chessboard that people live, regardless of what they are: kings and queens or ordinary pawns. And people struggle, they love and they kill and they get to think they are gods. This is the metaphor expressed by The Legend of the Last Emperor, a play by Valentin Nicolau.(…) Despite some lengthy and static moment, which effect from the meditative dimension of the play offering remarkable dialogues (a common feature in this playwright’s work) and even if the ending in his particular staging is not exactly convincing, the performance can be one lesson vital to the awakening of civic spirit, now dangerously asleep in Romania. (Cristina Modreanu, An X-ray of Paranoia, Adevărul de weekend)

“Like Snow White and the Two”/ Ca Zăpada şi cei doi

In 2003 the play was adapted and produced for the Public Radio Station by director Dan Puican. The first release was on the 12^th of May, 2003, at 8:30 p.m.

Directed and adapted by Dan Puican

Music by George Marcu

Studio production by Violeta Berbiuc

Casting: Virgil Ogăşanu, Şerban Cellea, Irina Movilă, Radu Panamarenco, Jeanine Stavarache, Sorin Gheorghiu, Delia Nartea, Gheorghe Pufulete

„Last autumn I went through several collections of Romanian plays and this is how I got to pay attention to the work by Valentin Nicolau. First I read his collection of plays called “The Last Emperor” and then I got to “If I Were and Angel”, where ran into a play which I liked a lot, “Like Snow White and the Two”. This is how I decided to make a performance for the public radio theatre.

This is not a difficult play, it is not a political parable. An old man finds himself with an undesirable tenant in his one-room apartment. And his narrow moral universe is thus troubled by the intruder’s presence and also by the need for communication. The character is a combination of stupor, lack of understanding, shyness and surprise when faced with what is new. And the third presence in this one-room apartment is a girl, the hotline phone operator.

The relationships the three characters establish are endowed with subtle delicacy and solidarity, although they detest each other. But they can no longer live one without the other. The characters imagined by Valentin Nicolau are poetical and they prove a hidden sense of humour, which I trued to express in the radio performance in the play of actors as exceptional as Virgil Ogăşanu, Irina Movilă and Şerban Cellea. (…) The realistic dimension of this production is sure to attract you, so listen to the show and you won’t be disappointed.” (Dan Puican, In Search of a Romanian Play for the Present, Revista programelor de Radio, May 12-18, 2003)