The warrior woman and her contemporary alternatives

“The Warrior Woman” is the title of a novel wrote by Maxine Hong Kingston, an American Writer born to a Chinese immigrant family. Girls in traditional Chinese families have two alternatives when it comes to their future: “wives and slaves” or “warriors and heroines” like the creator of the “White Crane” fighting style. I would like to create as a bridge, spanning over the years and create a parallel between them and Joan of Arc, the maid who heard the voices of archangel Michael and of saints Catherine and Margaret. The voices led her in 1429 to the miraculous victory of the army she was in charge of even though she was only 17. Canonized after 400 years, she became the second protector saint of France. The story of the French heroine fascinated Mihai Maniutiu. This fascination turned into a show based on the cursed woman, the outlaw. The show is produced by SMART and TNB (with the support of Association Francaise d’Action Artistique-AFAA). “Joan of Arc. File pages” is based on a script written by the director and inspired from the original papers of the Orleans maid’s trial. The show is the only one in Romania selected to represent our country at the Avignon festival, one of the most important in Europe. Maniutiu follows the heroine’s relation with the outerworldly forces and constructs a show where the focus is laid on the sound and light and body language. The representation is based on Oana Pellea’s force. Oana Pelea is actually the director of SMART. She uses her voice and body to express “a small symphony of voices, warring in the martyr’s brain.” The inner torment going inside her head is the tension on which the show is based. The choreography and interpretation of French dancer Sylvain Groud (the angel) gives the show a plus of magnetism, although I found the relation between them rather inarticulate. The young actors Marius Galea and Gabriel Spahiu are doing a great job, bringing freshness and “light” into the show and underline the other side of it – the theatre in theatre method. Janine’s costumes are exactly what they should be, colouring in black – red and white the symbols of the show. Iuliana Valsan’s scenography is simple and effective. Some evil spirits say that they expected more from Maniutiu, but as this is all very relative I will conclude that I saw a great show with good music and actors that included a great dancer and the epithets may continue. As a matter of fact, Maniutiu is already a famous name and he is caught inside a small circle – if he tries to do something different, we fail to recognise his style. I think he cannot direct himself out of this.