News

On Friday 19^th December 2008, a new play by Petr Kolečko will open at the Činoherní studio [Drama Studio] in v Ústí nad Labem. Gods don’t play ice-hockey [Bohové hokej nehrají] was written specially for the theatre’s ensemble and deals with the atmosphere in an unnamed industrial city in the North of the Czech Republic.

The producing company ANT Production will present a new play by Arnošt Goldflam for six actresses Ženy a panenky [Dolls and Dollies] at the Theatre Na Dobešce.

Reviews of further productions of Havel’s Leaving.

A Havel season is underway at the Orange Tree Theatre in London. Besides Sam Walters’ production of Leaving there is a production of two other Havel plays in one evening: Audience and Horský hotel [Mountain Hotel].

Organised by Tristan Bates Theatre between November 2 and 8 2008, this event commemorates 90th anniversary of the establishment of independent Czechoslovak state. Six Czech plays that, in their own different ways, have had an impact on Czech drama of the Twentieth Century will have their staged reading in English.

A new musical comedy opened at the Broadway Theatre in Prague. The Prague premiere of Radek Balaš’s and Ondřej Brousek’s stage adaptation of the popular Czech movie, Dinner for Adele [Adéla ještě nevečeřela] co-written by Jiří Brdečka  and Oldřich Lipský and directed by the latter. This excellent production is well above other run of the mill musicals on offer in Prague.

The production of the latest play by Václav Havel at the Klicpera Theatre in Hradec Králové that opened on 11 October 2008 is exceptional from several points of view. First, the playwright meets again his director of choice, Andrej Krob who’s deservedly seen as a perfect “Havel director”. But it is also the director’s encounter with a new text by Václav Havel written after a pause of twenty years.

The first production of Havel’s latest play abroad opened at the Orange Tree Theatre in London. The author saw the gala performance on Friday and the show hinted that Havel’s Leaving is up for an interesting life on various stages around the world.

This autumn, Aura-Pont together with the Original Videojournal [Originální Videojurnál] and the MF DNES daily will be offering exclusive gifts to the lovers of everything connected with Jára Cimrman. Starting from today every Thursday, a DVD with one of the seven plays by the fictitious Czech master inventor and writer will be sold at newspaper vendors stalls and shops. The first to be made available is The Stand-In Performance [Záskok].

Thirty years ago, Václav Havel started a correspondence with the man who launched the Charter 77 Foundation, František Janouch. Now the Foundation gave Havel probably the most prestigious Czech literary award currently available: the Jaroslav Seifert Prize awarded on the eve of the Czech Nobel Prize winning poet anniversary since 1986.

The first premiere abroad of the latest play by Václav Havel opened last Friday night at the Orange Tree Theatre in London. The spectators in the hopelessly sold out theatre received the production of Leaving directed by the venue’s artistic director Sam Walter with enthusiasm.

The first production of Havel’s Leaving abroad opens this Friday in London. The play, directed by the artistic director of the Orange Tree Theatre in Richmond, will stay in repertory until December 13.

Sam Walters, the artistic director of the Orange Tree Theatre in Richmond who directed the British premiere of Leaving gave a short interview about the play, its author and his own production of the play to Aura Pont Agency’s Jitka Sloupová.