Our Stage Blog!
This summer, we’ve been working hard and having a blast with the very first cont.rar productions! It's all part of the exciting "In Dialog" project, implemented by Reactor with the wonderful goal of bringing together a fresh group of talented emerging artists. Two fantastic devised creations, crafted by two amazing artistic teams tackling bold and highly relevant themes for today's society, are ready to make their grand debut this September in Cluj-Napoca!
For our second show, the wonderfully intriguing Who I Was When I Wanted to Be, everyone is working tirelessly and joyfully to get it ready for the public on September 26 and 27. We caught up with the lovely Ioana Toloargă, who is directing and writing the play, to get some exciting behind-the-scenes insights into this beautiful project!
You started the creative process for this show in a rather unique way compared to other Reactor projects, beginning with a series of wonderful workshops with the artistic team. How was that first stage of work for you, combining the workshops with all the research and creative exploration?
Ioana Toloargă: When I started that first week of work with the team, I realized how incredibly valuable and powerful it is to pass things on. It’s something I truly believe in! I learned about devised theatre from the wonderful Petro (Petro Ionescu) and Fero (Ferenc Sinkó) during the Fresh Start residency, from Olivia Grecea’s inspiring book, and from all the amazing shows I’ve watched over the last few years. And now, in such a perfect setting, I got to work (and play, and explore!) alongside four super-talented actresses, passing the torch, continuing the journey, and revisiting or adapting those same wonderful exercises.
Looking back at our starting dynamic, two things feel incredibly important: we had already worked together and knew each other, which meant there was instant trust (no need to win anyone over, just a beautiful safety net throughout the process!), and we quickly discovered some wonderful shared themes and interests. I admit I was a bit nervous about starting from scratch in such a short time (although reading and listening to "This Problem Doesn't Exist"—a piece by our colleagues that had a lovely staged reading and an audio play at Auzit, written along with an early version of Casio during a university class—instantly gave us a head start in getting to know each other). Still, we leaped forward from that sweet starting point, juggling the pressure of time, university admissions, festivals, filming, calls, summer workshops, and that magical transition of one chapter of life ending and another beginning. It was the absolute perfect backdrop for a show about growing up! I’d love to share our journey through these wonderful stages:
We are 5 girls: and that instantly gave us a beautiful theme. I feel like we’re a team where we can simply ask, How are you feeling today?, and the answer blossoms into a poem or a performance. (And we kept talking about forms: performance, non-narrative/postdramatic theatre, collage, and... cartoons! I'm currently in a phase where I love writing inspired by the cartoons that left a mark on my childhood... and we discovered we all share this delightful passion!).
In childhood: a nostalgic and fun stage of remembering kindergarten celebrations and making lists of our absolute favorite cartoons.
Disney Princesses: From Totally Spies, Strawberry Shortcake, and Bibi Blocksberg to Hungarian Folk Tales and Scooby-Doo, we eventually arrived at our favorite Disney princesses and how they shaped us. This was a huge and exciting turning point for us, decided right at the end of our first week. Afterward, we happily re-watched the four cartoons together, read the fairy tales, and did some fun research. Rehearsals truly felt like cozy sleepovers, and I really hope that warm, playful energy shines through in the show!
The Workshop with Mihai Păcurar: We had this playful idea to project the tiny princesses from Kinder surprise eggs (a sort of tabletop style). That spark became a decision, and those little toy princesses turned into a fabulous kingdom of pink plastic! A huge thank you to Mihai for making it all seem so wonderfully easy.
The Construction: One long, beautiful summer day that seemed to stretch through August and halfway into September. A single, seamless day where we explored what and how to project, gathering a delightful collection of tiny objects, textures, pink details, Barbies, and princesses. Essentially, one day spent in the miniature kingdom of a (perhaps too) big girl. An incredibly honest day that the five of us spent together in the childhood room we’ve outgrown—and I think it’s just beautiful how we shared that sweet nostalgia and memory, filling it with our own stories, tattooing it onto the stage, and living in it. One long, wonderful day with five girls acting as one—rediscovering who she was when she wanted to be a princess. This was the stage where three magical layers beautifully fell into place: the proto-character, the performer, and that thin line in between (is this scene her memory, or is it still about the princess?!).
We don't have an ending: We don't have an ending. We don't have an ending. PANIC, WE DON'T HAVE AN ENDING! Haha, that was a recent panic, ENTIRELY MY OWN—I think I just couldn't bring myself to finalize this collage-show because that meant accepting it was coming to a close. Happily, we created several playful "false endings" and now, we have a wonderful, real ending!
Where we are now: We are eagerly awaiting the premiere and running dress rehearsals. In fact, that's exactly what we're heading off to do right now!
How did collaborating in this way work out, especially since you chose to build the artistic concept using devised theatre methods? What were the joys and challenges, and how did your role shift?
Ioana Toloargă: For me, it was incredibly exciting and a beautiful responsibility to play with and piece together texts from improvisations and writing exercises. This shared, deeply personal material has a vulnerability that constantly moves and amazes me. We have this Google Doc—our very first one, actually—titled WRITING EXERCISES (written exactly like that, in bold capital letters!). To me, that document is our very first show in itself, complete with the texts we didn’t include in the final stage draft and all the lovely, enthusiastic comments ("amazing!", "let's keep this!", "where does this go?", "so beautiful – let's integrate this!") that mirror our entire search. Beyond that, I feel that working in a devised way brought us closer together, helping us step into the same atmosphere and easily set the rules for our creative collage. I acted as dramaturg and director to help organize the material, find a direction, and create a flow. But the actual creative construction belongs to all of us, and we happily share that responsibility (from buying little stage shoes to hunting down the perfect toys!).
How does this collaborative approach reflect in the final show, and how does it connect with the themes you are exploring? What did you discover while working with this wonderful team?
Ioana Toloargă: I really feel (and I hope our lovely audience will feel it too!) that this method shines brightest in the collage structure of the show. We chronologically follow a girl’s—a princess's—journey of growing up: birth, early childhood, adolescence, relationships with parents, body image, and building an identity. We play delightfully with fairy tale and cartoon tropes, creating response scenes to key moments from four classic stories (Sleeping Beauty, Belle, Jasmine, and Ariel): the fairy godmothers, the first kiss, arguments with fathers, and the grand ball or wedding. Each princess shares her story, exploring different styles of storytelling. But the magical part is that every scene is sprinkled with a personal comment, a response, or a real memory. The Disney magic gently peels back to reveal something very genuine underneath—Romanian childhood in the 2000s, real bodies we cannot deny or hide, and the sweet, constant dance between the ideal and the real. This beautiful fragmentariness, the lively give-and-take, and the dynamic of building and rebuilding in every scene are exactly where the devised process and the blend of personal and fictional worlds come alive!
How do you think the show will be received, keeping in mind that you'll be touring in towns where access to theatre is a bit limited, and that your target audience is teenagers?
Ioana Toloargă: It’s a heartfelt show about growing up, identity, and nostalgia. I truly feel—and I hope with all my heart I'm right, as I'm so close to this project—that it carries a beautiful freshness, honesty, and authenticity. I want our relationship with the audience to be just as wonderfully sincere. I hope they see themselves in it... and perhaps, we can all sit together in that childhood room of ours, realize we've outgrown it, and find comfort in knowing that that is absolutely okay. I hope it makes growing up feel a little less daunting and a lot more beautiful!
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