Over two years ago the National Theatre in Targu-Mures
contacted Entr'Actes about organising the ''Face
à Face'' festival. It was an ambitious project
based on the idea of reciprocity that was to be composed
of two parts - one devoted to contemporary French
plays in Rumania, and the other to Rumanian plays
in France.
Entr'Actes immediately agreed to participate
in the festival - as far as its means would allow
- by sending a wide selection of plays, providing
financial assistance to have the plays translated
and a volume including several of the translations
published by Editions Lyra, Valsul Hazardului,
Dramaturgie Franceza Contemporana, as well as covering
expenses for the playwrights who went to the festival
in Targu-Mures in February 2001.
Entr'Actes was eager to support this programme
from the start for two reasons. First, it was a way
of responding to the Rumanian theatre world's strong
desire for communication. Secondly, it gave contemporary
French playwrights access to Rumanian stages, which
censors had only allowed to produce traditional works
in the years before 1989. The event was also an opportunity
to reforge bonds that had linked stages in our two
countries before the Second World War.
Entr'Actes also confirmed its policy of diversity
through the eclecticism of the plays selected. Finally,
its participation was a gesture towards this region
of Europe, and the Rumanians' Francophile tradition
is in great need of bolstering.
We hope that the Rumanian Theatre Week in France will
receive the kind of welcome and coverage that is appropriate
for what is at stake here - namely, presenting and
seeing plays that French-speaking audiences have yet
to discover.
Sabine Bossan, director of Entr'Actes
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