“I chose this story because it speaks honestly, with humanity and humour, about people from three corners of Europe who are trying to connect and rediscover meaning in a world full of contradictions. I am glad and feel challenged to work with an international cast and that the performance will be staged in three languages. The beauty of the text written by Elise Wilk also lies in the fact that, no matter where they begin, all the stories return, in one way or another, to Romania and its past.” — Cristian Ban
Sophie accidentally meets Darius in a Viennese café, and from there it is only a small step to something more than a one-night affair. In post-communist Timișoara, Mariana and Rudi meet again after several decades, sharing their lives, hopes, and the failures they have experienced during the years spent apart. While awaiting an important visit somewhere in Luxembourg, tensions arise within the couple Daniela and Walter over the way each of them relates to the children from their previous marriages.
None of these characters, however, is aware of how their destinies intertwine with those of the others.
By weaving together three parallel stories to illustrate a radiography of uprootedness, Elise Wilk creates a trilingual, polyphonic text about the human condition in today’s Europe—one that, having left behind the terror of dictatorship, nevertheless risks repeating the mistakes of the past.
Elise Wilk proposes a play about self-searching and loss, about identity and belonging, mapping out a micro-universe populated by characters whose destinies reconstruct a fragment of the relatively recent history of this part of Europe.
While the experience of exile and imposed or self-chosen exile among members of the German-speaking community in Romania during communism serves as a central premise both in this text and in other plays by the author, the dramatic approach of Union Place reveals a broader panorama of the human condition in a globalized contemporary world. Mothers seeking to reconnect with sons they left behind in order to offer them a better life from afar; children protecting their parents by hiding the truth and fabricating scenarios meant to spare them disappointment; former lovers meeting again after many years only to revisit those final moments together that irrevocably changed the course of their lives—an array of poignantly familiar characters unfolds their lives in a text of near-neorealist authenticity.
Cristian Ban is a Romanian theatre director, recognized for productions developed through collective creative processes, in close collaboration with actors. He graduated in theatre directing from the Faculty of Theatre and Television at Babeș-Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca. He has completed international residencies in Germany (2007) and at 7 Stages Theater in Atlanta, USA (2015/2016), and since 2024 he has been coordinating the directing master’s program at the University of Arts in Târgu Mureș. He has staged over 40 productions in theatres across Romania, including Bucharest, Timișoara, Cluj, Galați, Sfântu Gheorghe, Arad, Piatra Neamț, Brăila, Baia Mare, and Satu Mare. His productions have been selected for major Romanian theatre festivals—such as the National Theatre Festival (Bucharest), FITS (Sibiu), FestCo, FITPTI (Iași), TESZT and Fest-FDR (Timișoara), and the National Comedy Festival (Galați)—and have also been presented internationally in Germany, Poland, Hungary, Spain, and Turkey. He has received numerous awards for directing and best performance at national festivals and has earned several UNITER Award nominations, including for Best Performance, Best Director, and Best New Play Production.
Elise Wilk, born in 1981 in Brașov into a bilingual family, is a playwright and translator.
Her plays have been staged in numerous theatres in Romania and abroad (Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Italy, Greece, Cyprus, Russia, Hungary, Bulgaria, Georgia, the Czech Republic, Poland, Finland, and Serbia). Her works have been translated into 15 languages and published in eight countries. She is the author of over 20 plays that have received multiple awards, most recently the Aurora Prize for Eastern European Drama, awarded in Poland in 2022 for the play Disappearances. Forbes Romania named her among the young trendsetters of 2014, and Decât o Revistă included her among the 100 People for Tomorrow’s Romania (2018). She has participated in numerous international programs, including the Young European Authors Forum at the Wiesbaden Theatre Biennale (Germany, 2014), Hot Ink at Lark Theatre in New York (2015), Fabulamundi. Playwriting Europe (2013–2020), GalataPerform Istanbul (2021), What Europe Dreams About (Belgrade, 2024), and Fabulamundi.New Voices (since 2023). She holds a PhD in Theatre and Performing Arts (University of Arts in Târgu Mureș, 2020), with a thesis on theatre for young audiences in Romania, and since 2021 she has been a university lecturer at the same institution, teaching in the Playwriting Master’s program.
Andreea Săndulescu graduated in 2008 from the Scenography Department of the University of Fine Arts in Bucharest (Faculty of Decorative Arts and Design). Since completing her studies, she has become a highly regarded set designer, working both in major theatres across Romania and on set designs for music videos, commercials, and concerts. Among the most notable theatre productions she has worked on are Incendies (directed by Alexandru Mâzgăreanu; Constanța State Theatre), The Great Gatsby (directed by Andrei Huțuleac; Bragadiru Palace – Bucharest), Hotel PM (directed by Andreea Gavriliu; German State Theatre), for which she received the Award for Best Scenography at the “I Plead for You(th)” Theatre Festival in 2015, The Snow Queen (directed by Rosamunde Hutt; Ion Creangă Theatre), and Thieves (directed by Radu Afrim; “I.L. Caragiale” National Theatre). Her work as a set designer for short films and music videos has also earned her accolades, including a Scenography Award at the Cinemaiubit Festival 2011 (Grand Hotel Italia, directed by Rodi Cotenescu), as well as collaborations with prominent figures in contemporary Romanian music, such as Inna, Antonia, and Deepcentral. At the Radu Stanca National Theatre Sibiu, her work includes productions by the German Section such as Quartett (directed by Hunor Horvath), Messages to the Universe (directed by Josef Maria Krasanovsky), and Yvonne (directed by Botond Nagy).
