Artistic director

Date and place of birth: 14.11.1951, Huedin, Cluj County

Studies: Institute of Architecture Iași, 1975 and Institute of Theatrical and Cinematographic Art "ILCaragiale" Bucharest, 1986, class of prof. Cătălina Buzoianu – Gheorghe Vitanidis

Director Laurian Oniga was employed at the State Theatre in Oradea in 1987, and in 1990, after the Revolution, he left for Bucharest, for a good part of the time he was active in politics, alongside Nicolae Manolescu, and thus absent from the theatre. He then began to collaborate with various theatres in the country: the Giuleşti Theatre in Bucharest, the National Theatre in Timişoara (employed as artistic director and artistic director), the Constanta Dramatic Theatre (employed as artistic director and artistic director), the National Theatre and the Small Theatre in Bucharest, the "Al.Davilla" Theatre in Piteşti (employed as artistic director), the "Tony Bulandra" Theatre in Bucharest. Since 2000 he has been employed at the "Ion Slavici" Theatre in Arad and, shortly after, he also takes over the management of the theatre as general director.

Having also trained in architecture, Laurian Oniga "sees" a dramatic text in all its dimensions, imagining it as a solid construction in which everything must be carefully thought out. Elaborating a show demands a lot from him: long before rehearsals begin, he prepares, looks for translation options (or retranslates the plays that interest him himself), works on the text, proposes his own versions. He does not like to follow the beaten path, being interested in new texts, he is concerned with originality, but "not at any cost", but one dictated by the structure, the message, by his personal vision of the play. Laurian Oniga is what is called "a director with a program", an artist permanently concerned with certain authors, certain plays, certain themes. Very interested in the social phenomenon, Laurian Oniga has always been, in the best sense of the word, a committed director, whose shows unmistakably contain his point of view, his attitude; but the updating is not something glued on, something forced, but rather, it naturally stems from his ability to "read between the lines", to emphasize what interests him in the text and, not last but first, to choose those pieces through which he can best express himself.

The idea of staging an expressionist play ("The Master Singer") by Franz Wedekind, an author rarely performed in Romania, was commendable. It was a premiere in the country. Doina Modola welcomed the "unitary reading" of the difficult play, and Dumitru Chirilă noted the "narrow range" on which he worked. It was certainly not an important victory, although it is possible that he, as an artist, was useful for being close to Wedekind's theater.

Shortly before the 1989 revolution, Laurian Oniga staged, with good results, both artistically and… financially, a comedy that was sure to be a hit with the public: „A Funeral Party” by Pierre Chesnot. Some critics were scared by the somewhat frivolous option; in fact, the director understood the institution's financial needs and accepted the theater's proposal. But he tried, as critics have mentioned, to „intellectualize” the „Chesnot industry manufacturer” text – even risking a „shift towards the allegorical”.

His best show was "The Cherry Orchard" (he worked on the translation together with the literary secretary Elisabeta Pop). A cohesive, well-cast show, with vague "Dostoevskyian inserts" (Dumitru Chirilă). The show emphasized "immaturity, as a state of being buried" (Marian Popescu). The originality of Laurian Oniga's vision is also noted by Mircea Morariu, who observes that "the actors portray a tragic-buffoonish humanity".

(Presentation by Eugen Ţugulea)

Artistic sheet – Oradea State Theatre

• Artistic direction of A STORMY NIGHT by ILCaragiale, 1987
• Artistic direction for THE MASTER SINGER by Frank Wedekind, 1988
• Artistic direction of A FUNERAL PARTY by Pierre Chesnot, 1989
• Directed and translated (together with Elisabeta Pop) in THE CHERRY ORCHARD by A.P. Chekhov, 1990