Text author: Mircea Morariu
Taken from: contributors.ro

Mimi Brănescu is an actor by profession. More of a film actor than a theater or television actor. But above all, at least in the public's consciousness, he is the screenwriter of the sitcom Las Fierbinți. Mimi Brănescu is also an industrious author of plays. Plays that are not necessarily supported by action, but by lines. Savory, intelligent, that provoke laughter without being even a single vulgar moment. The Oradea public was able to see this almost two years ago when the playwright himself descended on the local Regina Maria Theater as a director. He did it to stage his own writing called Genul acustativ. They can also see it in the current season when the new theater, Transylvania, is playing Mimi Brănescu's The Last Ones. A kind of Home to Dad and especially a kind of Country Life, in a different way.

Ultimii has nothing of the romanticism of the Roman Comăneștenilor. Just as the only female character in the play, Luminița, does not resemble the delicate Sașa at all. The woman has to fight with the imposture of her husband, a certain Lulu, and with the various whims of her father-in-law. An invalid named Ică. In Ultimii, Luminița is, in Caragiale's words, violent and without manners, she very often and with great conviction scolds her husband and keeps threatening to leave. To leave the marital home. Which is, as I said, somewhere, at her father's, that is, her father-in-law's, home, in a village somewhat forgotten by the world, but which nevertheless has a train station. It could not be otherwise since Mimi Brănescu was born and it seems that she spends her days in Lehliu Gară. That is, exactly where, about fifty years ago, Ion Băieșu made Tanța and Costel meet, after they had discovered at the train station in Medgidia that love is a big thing.

So, Lulu is an artist by nature. Or so she wants to seem. She's a DJ and a guitarist, but she lives mostly off the money sent from abroad by Luminița's sister. Lulu has been working on her life's work for about a year. Which turns out to be just a poor remix of a famous Eric Clapton song. Layla. Marcu, the older brother, reveals the lie to Luminița. And that's where it all begins. That is, an endless series of revelations about all four characters in the song. And after all the things have been said, after the dust and the powder have settled on the traditional family x-rayed in its contemporaneity by Mimi Brănescu, Marcu and Luminița take their beautiful little steps. Luminița seems to have decided to divorce. Not for nothing, but Eric Clapton also abandoned his wife in the exact year he composed Layla. And yet Luminița turns around. She's not her husband Eric Clapton, nor is she of the caliber of the artist's wife.

The latter are playing in Oradea, directed by Denisa Irina Vlad. An actress tempted, perhaps, by the miracle of directing. Whose voluptuousness she proves that she knows how to savor both professionally and in moderation. Denisa Irina Vlad understood the message or, rather, the essence of the play. It is not for nothing that the show she directed begins with musical accompaniment of the flute and continues to the sound of The Penguin and manele. In addition, Denisa Vlad has put together an excellent cast. And so it is that we (re)discover Pavel Sîrghi playing a talkative old man ravaged by all the diseases in the world. Sorin Ionescu plays Marcu with determination. The apparently serious man, abandoned, the poor one, by an unfaithful wife. Later we find out that the first culprit of infidelity was Marcu himself. The character's universe collapses. Marcu's mask falls. Luminița is played impetuously, that is, as it should be, with nerve, pasty, by Giorgiana Coman. Denisa Vlad herself plays her in much the same way. With force. It is not at all excluded that in this case we have proof of Victor Ion Popa's words about the actor-director.

The great revelation of the show, however, is the young David Constantinescu. Absolutely excellent in Lulu. Master of the role, dynamic, with a strength that I didn't even suspect some time ago when I saw him in Explosiv. I hope that from now on he will be given roles to match. Alin Stanciu also plays the same role. An experienced actor with a defined position in the troupe. His Lulu is more boyish, more southern, without guns in his belt. And that's good.

Queen Maria Theater in Oradea
THE MARGINALS by Mimi Branescu

Directed by: Denisa Irina Vlad
Scenography: Răzvan Chendrean
Musical adaptation: Ovidiu Iloc
Lyrics: George Dometi

With: Pavel Sirghi (Ica), Sorin Ionescu (Mark), David Constantinescu/Alin Stanciu, (Lulu), Giorgiana Coman/Denisa Vlad (Luminița)