Text taken from contributors.ro / author: Mircea Morariu

For many years, certainly many over 30, I have tried to explain to successive series of students that the French 17th century is neither (or is not only) the Classical Century, nor the Great Century, nor the Century of Louis XIV. That all these labels only partially cover its historical, artistic, philosophical, aesthetic and literary complexity, and that once criticism and literary history have discovered the beauties and delights of the Baroque, and have also found a good part of its preciousness (as opposed to the ridiculousness in which it failed), it would be appropriate to set aside many of the statements in the old textbooks, products of academics from the old Sorbonne tradition and from the old criticism. After all, rules, order, balance dominated only part of the century in question.

Classicism was not a monolith either, because, for example, even the great tragedian Racine, who was often said to have been a glove to the rules, allowed himself to be contaminated from time to time by the beautiful oddities of the only apparent unpolished Baroque. Corneille, Racine, Molière were not even remotely like brothers, beyond their great merits Richelieu and the Sun King wanted the unconditional submission of artists to official aesthetics. La Fontaine, for example, was not at all liked by Louis XIV, and Molière exercised a secret dissent not only towards the Church and openly regarding the countless les faux dévots, but also in relation to the dramaturgical formulas agreed upon at Court. La Princesse de Clèves was both a classic novel, as well as Jansenist and Baroque, the public enjoyed what the so-called great classics wrote, as well as the creations of Paul Scarron, Charles Sorel and - last but not least - Cyrano de Bergerac.

I was thinking about all this while watching the performance of the play Cyrano de Bergerac, a modern, lively, inspired, at times even iconoclastic rewriting of the score of the same name by Edmond Rostand, thanks to the British Martin Crimp. The show was staged in the Great Hall of the Regina Maria Theater in Oradea by Horia Suru. The same one who staged Noduri și placii here years ago, a production that Alexandra Felseghi, Andrei Măjeri and Ioana Gajdó reminded me of only two weeks ago in Goddesses of Category B.

Martin Crimp probably has a certain passion for French culture since he has translated quite a few texts and, in addition to Cyrano...he also wrote a personal version of Moliere's The Misanthrope.

It's true, I was also thinking about the fact that it's not exactly okay that another play by the same playwright appears in the Theatre's repertoire just two months after Cruelty and Tenderness, that diversity, alternation are or should be basic considerations of the very concept of repertoire. That the repertoire is not a collection of titles. And that it is not made by directors. I will not elaborate further.
Now the idea, I've done it before and still in vain.

How is Crimp's play? How is Horia Suru's show? The play is undoubtedly good. At least in its first part it respects the sought-after disorder, that artistic irregularity that characterized the creation, insofar as it is, of Cyrano. Horia Suru tried to manage the disorder in question as efficiently as possible. One in the specifics of the baroque, but also of a way of making theater that depends mainly on the taste of the audience. The show begins in the foyer, where we meet a good part of the actors in the cast dressed in civilian clothes. Once inside the hall, the one called Lignière (seemingly too expansive, too noisy in the role of Sebastian Lupu), introduces us to the newest recruit. Christian, a young, handsome, frustrated, clearly uneducated boy, who doesn't really understand what's happening to him, why he's being turned on all sides, applauded, mocked, booed, taken in retaliation by the assistants. The initial silence will be replaced further by the verbiage, the courage, the disarming naturalness of the character, the revolt in the face of falsehood, whether it is done with or out of good intentions. All well captured by Răzvan Vicoveanu's acting. All kinds of noisy characters from the audience appear. Leila Ragueneau, a literature teacher and confectioner, has an explosive entrance (I liked Elvira Rîmbu, however, especially in the last ten to fifteen minutes of the show when I seemed to find the actress from Hey, good people!), and later, when we are in the middle of a theater within a theater (a fact effectively suggested by Tudor Prodan's set design that resorts to a few red chairs placed on the sides of the stage) we see the veteran actor Montfleury playing Hamlet (Petre Ghimbășan) badly, as badly as one could possibly play him). Deliberately so. We also see the versatile and immoral director of the Theater (Șerban Borda), De Guiche, Richelieu's reliable man with the tics of a sugary old man who still wants to have sex (Daniel Vulcu), accompanied by the beautiful Roxane (Alina Leonte, very good in the role). Also appearing is a certain De Bret (a rather bored little Sorin Ionescu, obviously unconvinced of what he is doing), De Guiche's quasi-ridiculous deputy named Valvert (the impetuous and kind George Dometi), a cajon priest and a bit of a fool (the tasty Pavel Sîrghi), Literature students (Georgiana Coman, Carina Bunea, Denisa Irina Vlad, Anda Tămășanu, Adelina Tripa), soldiers (Ciprian Ciuciu, Alin Stanciu, Eugen Neag, Paul Tripon, David Constantinescu, Tudor Manea, Cosmin Petruț).

Horia Suru coordinates the mass scenes well, convincingly transposes the throbbing of the crowds onto the stage, despite the fact that some actors and especially actresses are not as concerned with their roles as they should be (in some cases, the fault lies in the overestimation of the professional capabilities of some actors and especially actresses who yearn for leading roles without real artistic grounds and want to show us at all costs that they have professional developments), and a little later, that is, in the second part, helped by the set designer, Adrian Dominte, who prepared the actors remarkably well for the moments of artistic fencing, he transposes the war onto the stage in a relevant way. This is by no means and never a simple task. War is both classic and modern. Deliberately indecisive,

Naturally, Cyrano also appears. With his big nose, with his iconoclastic spirit, with all the rebellion in his endowment, with the madness of chasing Montfleury off the stage, even if it costs him a fortune, with the unparalleled art of handling words. All of this is well captured by Richard Balint. A good thing, however, situated rather in the area of correctness than in that of the desired excellence. It's as if I would have wanted even more madness in the construction of the character. A greater dose of histrionics. Of non-conformism. Ingredients that would place the character in opposition to that Cyrano from the second part, the one in which the iconoclast (well, the jemenficist) will prove to be hypersensitive, to the point of sacrificing himself in love with Roxane. To show us who Cyrano really is, how sentimental, in love and how sad, I don't think there was a need for the two songs that seem too visibly to be a tribute to a fashion from the time of the Flacăra circle and the glory days of Nicu Alifantis.

The second part of the editing is undoubtedly more connected. And clearer. Not linear. Maybe because it only has two big clear themes. Love and war. And the ending is warm, human, beautiful, moving.

REGINA MARIA Theater in Oradea

CYRANO DE BERGERAC by Martin Crimp
Free adaptation of the play by Edmond Rostand
Translation: Marian Popescu
Artistic director: Horia Suru
Scenography: Tudor Prodan
Artistic fencing: Andrei Dominte

With: Richard Balint (Cyrano de Bergerac), Răzvan Vicoveanu (Christian), Elvira Rîmbu (Leila Ragueneau), Alina Leonte (Roxane), Daniel Vulcu (De Guiche), Sebastian Lupu (Lignière), Sorin Ionescu (De Bret), Șerban Borda (Theatre Director), Petre Ghimbașan (Montfleury), Pavel Sîrghi (An Annoying Person, A Priest), George Dometi (Valvert), Georgiana Coman, Carina Bunea, Denisa Irina Vlad, Anda Tămășanu, Adelina Tripa (Students at the Faculty of Letters, Other roles), Ciprian Ciuciu, Alin Stanciu, Eugen Neag, Paul Tripon, David Constantinescu, Tudor Manea, Cosmin Petruț (Soldiers, Other roles)