Saviana Stanescu is a Romanian-born playwright and one of the most outstanding Eastern European writers. She lives in New York City and teaches at the Drama Department at the New York University. Her plays have won important awards such as the John Golden Award for Excellence in Playwriting or the MARULIC Prize for Best European Radio-drama.

By Alexandra Fodor

Saviana Stanescu was born in 1967 in Bucharest, Romania. She holds an MA in Performing Studies and an MFA in Dramatic Writing, both from the Tisch School of Arts, New York University.

She has published books of poetry and drama including The New York Plays, Alliens With Extraordinary Skills, Waxing West, Google me!, Black Milk, The Inflatable Apocalypse. Her short play Aurolac Blues, was published in the anthology Plays and Playwrights 2006.

She has been a visiting professor at CUNY Grad Center, Lee Strasberg Institite for Theatre & Film, Playwrights Horizons Theatre School, Fordham University, Rutgers University, Brown University, Hofstra University, Hartford College, Smith College, Penn State University, University of Chattanooga, and London University.

Her texts were published in journals such as The Drama Review (TDR), American Theatre, Poetry London, Exquisite Corps, Pen Club Magazine, The Temple Watchword, Absinthe, The Saint Ann’s Review, www.offbroadway.com, www. nytheatre.com. Her plays have been presented in the United States, UK, France, Austria, Hungary, Switzerland, Macedonia, and Montenegro.

In 2002, she won the Antoine Vitez Center Award for the French edition of Final Countdown play. In 2004, she won the John Golden Award for Excellence in Playwriting and in 2007, she won the Innovative Theatre Award for Outstanding Original Full-Length Script. The same year she won the MARULIC Prize for Best European Radio-drama for Bucharest Underground.

Between 2005 and 2007 she was Director of Playwright Exchange at Lark Play Development Center in US and between 2007 and 2008 she was a Visiting Professor at Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute.

She has readings and workshops at the New York Theatre Workshop, Playwrights Foundation, The Lark Play Development Center, Immigrants Theatre Project, Julia Miles Theatre, Voice & Vision, Actor’s Studio, Traveling Jewish Theatre and Martin Segal Theatre.  She is currently Artistic Advisor at Lark Play Development Center, US and professor at the New York University, Tisch School of the Arts where she teaches in the Drama Department.

Read more about Saviana Stanescu on her website here.

alex@romania-insider.com