by Frank Wedekind
Translation: Simion Danila
National premiere

Artistic direction: Laurian Oniga
Scenography: Maria Maliţa
Soundtrack: Mircea Piciu
Premiere date: February 2, 1988

Considered by critic Mircea Morariu as a character study, the play "The Master Singer" resumes the debate on the issue of the artist's condition in society. "The modernity of the text lies in the very special way in which the theme is presented. Gerardo, the protagonist of the play, is no longer the marginalized artist, the misunderstood aspirant to celebrity, condemned to fight to affirm his value; a Wagnerian singer of great talent, he is a public idol, a kind of "luxury item" for the fashionable world, a slave to success that leads him to dehumanization. He is a simple puppet performing a mechanical ballet meant to show him in a counterfeit grandeur to the superficial and blasé world that idolizes and devours him. The self-imposed vitality, the controlled arrogance, the false halo that make him remain under the glass bell that suffocates his personality, counterpointed by the encounter with the "intruders" who threaten the hero's safety and inhuman coldness, create a nightmarish atmosphere around him." (Mircea Em. Morariu in "Steaua" no. 3/1988).

„"Assailed by admirers – from excited girls to fellow actors who would like to establish an artistic dialogue, making him the depositary of their trust – Gerardo proves incapable of any relationship, the brilliant interpreter of Tristan, Tannhäuser or Siegfried being in "civilian" a depersonalized individual, subject to the point of slavery to contracts, professional obligations, conventions of all kinds that not only take up every bit of his time, but have annihilated him spiritually, confining him to a simply amoral egoism. In fact, the play consists of three revelatory encounters for the configuration of the titular hero (as an emotional handicapper, executioner and victim at the same time), and decisive for the three partners, namely a teenage girl who confuses the character with the interpreter, letting herself be seduced by the brilliance of the former and ready to fall into the arms of the latter; an old, unfulfilled musician – eager to obtain an authoritative opinion on his work, to break the wall of indifference that he has been struggling against for a lifetime; and a woman in her prime who loves him totally, irreducibly and, in the end, fatally. In each of the three dialogues, Gerardo will prove incapable of communication and understanding. Lucid at times („We, the artists, are a luxury item of the bourgeoisie”), sketching a timid protest („My chains are tighter than the harness of a carriage horse”), but ultimately converting everything into vanity and self-admiration („I do not belong to myself, I belong to my art„), he persists with delight in voluntary slavery where there is no room for either love or understanding.” (Dumitru Chirilă in ”Familia„, March 1988).

Distribution:

Gerardo:  Daniel Vulcu
Mrs. Helena Marowa:  Eniko Kovacs
Professor Dühring:  Marcel Segărceanu
Miss Isabel Koeurne:  Lioara Bradu
Voices:
Muller:  Marcel Popa
The servant:  Nicolae Barosan
The lift driver:  George Voinese

Technical director: Elena Varlam
Prompter: Florence Szabo
Lighting: Vasile Blejan, Iosif Balogh
Sound: Alexandru Tudose