*13. 2. 1948
Studied
dramaturgy and script-writing at the řlm Faculty of the Academy of
Performing Arts in Prague and worked for a short time in Barrandov film
Studios, then as an editor in Orbis publishing house. Has been a
free-lance writer since 1974. She is the author or co-author of several
feature, short and animated films. She writes poetry and prose for
children and as well as radio plays. She found her most distinctive
expression as an author of plays for the theatre and became the most
original writer of drama at the turn of the 1970s and 1980s. Under
Communism, the work of Fischerová and Karel Steigerwald was barely
tolerated by the authorities, and created an alternative to the oficial
stage.
LIST OF PLAYS:
/ Hodina mezi psem a vlkem (Between Dog and Wolf), 1979, première 24. 3. 1979 Realistické divadlo Zdeňka Nejedlého, Prague
/ Princezna T. (Princess T.), 1986, première 28. 10. 1986 Státní divadlo - Činohra Petra Bezruče, Ostrava
/ Báj (A Tale / A Legend), 1987, première 28. 11. 1987 Státní divadlo - Činohra Petra Bezruče, Ostrava
/ Strašidelný dům (The Haunted House), 1989, première 6. 11. 1991 Divadlo na Starém Městě, Prague
/ Pletení se snářem (Knitting with a Dream Book), 1990, première 6. 3. 1990 Ústřední loutkové divadlo, Prague
/ Masážní stůl (Massage Table), 1992
/ Náhlé neštěstí (Sudden Misfortune), 1993, première 1. 6. 1993 Viola, Prague
/ Pantomima (Pantomime), 1995, première 20. 1. 1995 Spolek Kašpar, Divadlo v Celetné, Prague
/ Pták Ohnivák (The Firebird), 1999, première 7. 12. 2000 Národní divadlo, Prague
TRANSLATED PLAYS:
/
Hodina mezi psem a vlkem English - Between Dog and Wolf / The Hour
between Dog and Wolf / Dog and Wolf, French - L' Heure entre Chien et
Loup, German - Stunde zwischen Hund und Wolf, Russian - Čas mezdu psom
i volkom
/ Princezna T. English - Princess T., German - Prinzessin T.
/ Báj English - A Tale
/ Náhlé neštěstí English - Sudden Misfortune
BÁJ / A LEGEND
3 men, 2 women, chorus
The
legend of the play´s ambiguous title is the story of the Pied Piper of
Hamelin. Fischerová´s play also has the atmosphere of the mythical
Middle Ages: the city with its organisations, ceremonies, superstitions
and miracles, witchcraft and - inquisitions. The supernatural is
naturally part of reality, a reality witch is also metaphorical. Into
this world comes Johan with his mysterious wife, who has been pregnant
for far longer than she should have been. Johan finds asylum in
Hamelin, but then unconsciously brings destruction on the whole city,
because he has written off an inquisition and is now fleeing from the
consequences of his act. The abbot refuses to hand him over to the
inquisition´s emissary. Gradually we learn that Johan´s coming to
Hamelin was not entirely at odds with the aims of the inquisition. The
abbot has paradoxically needed the inquisition´s blesssing in order to
protect the city from its influence - now he is getting on its wrong
side again. Every choice seems to be predestined to be a mistake. The
rebel city is isolated from the rest of the world and the pretext of it
being rife with plague. Than the Pied Piper comes. „The Devil never
buys half a soul," may be a quotation from Fischerová´s Princess T, but
it could also be the leitmotif of A Legend, whose heroes at some point
in the unequal battle - but also of their own will - lose their
freedom. This modern tragedy was one of the theatrical events of the
period just before November 1989.
The
author creates a contemporary meditation on personal freedom, on
awakening of the conscience, on choice. (...) The play is written with
a feel for stylish sophistication and purity, and, through its sense of
rich and multilayer context of ideas and through the construction of
the whole, of the situations and of its dialogues, it opens
possibilities for creativity to both the actors and the staging team.
vá: Pochmurná báj o lidské naději, Ostravský večerník, 7.4.1988
NÁHLÉ NEŠTĚSTÍ / SUDDEN MISFORTUNE
1 woman, 1 man
A
dramatic dialogue for a man and a woman whose fates, personalities and
attitudes are inspired by the Biblical Job and the classical Niobe.
Their meeting takes place in front of a semi-transparent mirror in a
psychiatric sanatorium where both patients are in the department SA -
Sudden Accident. They are waiting for visits from relations who do not
turn up, and so are compelled to spend the long night alone just with
the cruel truth about themselves. The text is based on confrontations:
two religious traditions, the Jewish and the classical worlds, two
distinctive human attitudes towards "the divine" - humility and revolt,
which on an actual level permeate the patients' relationship to the
doctor and to superior authority in general - the confrontation of the
male and female principle (in the "lowest position", She is a neurotic
and unstable drug addict and He is a religious fanatic and weakling).
Paradoxically in the end both disclose testing the same knowledge which
brings them close in a symbolic embrace - their uncertainty about the
existence of God and at the same time their longing for it.
Bizarre
pedestrian and yet poetically philosophising dialogue turns into two
independent and at the same time internally corresponding monologues;
from mythological characters they become contemporary people.
(Vladimír Justl: Dvakrát z pražské Violy, Denní Telegraf, 17.12.1993)
FANTOMIMA / PHANTOMIME
1 woman, 4 men
The
smile of the Unknown from the Seine and a mysterious phantom of the
motorways inspired the author to write a story about the aging opera
star Anna and her professional driver Oscar, who on the morning of New
Year's Eve runs her over on a bridge. Both are summoned, and an
investigation begins which leads to Oscar being sentenced (although in
the end Anna forgives him). Anna and Oscar are at times substituted by
dummies - phantoms - which in everyday life teach people how to act in
extreme situations (life-saving - Anna) or in simulating the
consequences of a tragic accident (a crash - Oscar). The whole play is
based on the opposite poles of these two possibilities: Anna cannot
commit suicide, because she is destined for continual revival, Oscar
can know nothing but death because he is continuously sent to it. The
trial is led by the Prosecutor and the Defence who are more concerned
with their own play between themselves than a matter of law, as though
they demonstrated all the anonymous social mechanisms which are put in
front of a person. The whole text and course of the trial are commented
on by the philosophising guide, the Reader. His character generalises
in aphoristic discourses, in the manner of the old moralities, the
meaning of the events presented.
After
a long time an original Czech play has emerged, written in a poetic
language which is out of the ordinary, not intended for television.
/.../ What we follow on stage is not so much a drama as a delicate pen
drawing /.../
(Vladimír Just: Důvody k plesání? Úvahy postdivadelní, Literární noviny, 9. 2. 1995)
It
is not only the materially topical theme, but above all the cultivated
and rich language of Daniela Fischerová which makes this play a truly
theatrical event.
(Ivan Matějka: Tajnosti zmaru a vzkříšení, Hospodářské noviny, 17. 2. 1995)