* 12. 11. 1951
Graduated in direction from the Janáček Academy of
Performing Arts in Brno (1974). His meeting with the director Jan
Grossman in the Theatre of Western Bohemia in Cheb in the 1970s had a
defining influence. From 1989 to 1996 he worked at the National Theatre
in Prague. His most important productions include A Year in the Country
(1993, Alfréd Radok Award for production of the year and the Award of
the Czech Literary Foundation for dramatisation). In 1996 he moved to
the Dejvice Theatre, a small Prague studio theatre where he works as
artistic director, directing, acting and writing dramatisations. He was
awarded the Prize of the Czech Literary Foundation in 2000 for his
version of Oblomov. Since 1991 he teaches acting in the Department for
Alternative and Puppet Theatre in the Theatre Faculty of the Academy of
Performing Arts in Prague. His appearance in the role of Father in Petr
Zelenka´s Tales of Common Insanity (in the stage premiere and later in
the film version) started his - now international - career as film
actor. Syrup (2002) is his first original play.
List of plays:
Rok na vsi, A Year in the Country, 1993, première 15. 4. 1993 Národní divadlo, Prague, (based on the book by Brothers Mrštík)
Utišující metoda, A Calming Method, 1997, première 20. 10. 1997 Dejvické divadlo, Prague (using motifs from E.A.Poe)
Neuvěřitelný
a tklivý příběh o spanilé Erendíře a její ukrutné babičce, The
Incredible and Sad Story of Candiada Erendira And Her Cruel
Grandmother, 1999, première 13. 11. 1999 Dejvické divadlo, Prague
(using motifs from G. García Marquez)
Oblomov, 2000, première 1. 12. 2000 Dejvické divadlo, Prague (using motifs from I. A. Gontcharov)
Sirup, Syrup, 2002, première 16. 12. 2002 Dejvické divadlo, Prague
Idiot, 2008, première 12. 1. 2008 Dejvické divadlo, Prague (using motifs from Dostoyevsky)
Sirup / Syrup
3 women, 3 men
The
text emerges from the same experience and inspiration as the absurd,
model plays of Václav Havel, but Krobot's heroes are already the
product of the new reality. The dealers Havlena and Knobloch distribute
a miraculous one-hundred-percent biological syrup and prepare new
adepts for its distribution, among them Marie - Knobloch's mistress and
the wife of his best friend Hnízdil - and Marta. The stupefying phrases
of advertising slogans transfer in often bizarre mutations into their
everyday vocabularies, the obligatory optimism of their personal P.R.
alienates them from themselves. It is as if they have reached the last
stop in the rational sphere and realise themselves or already
concentrate almost all their strength in the sphere of eroticism and
sex. The author puts into play a chess game of relationships, partings
and repeated meetings. Completely in the spirit of Havel's dramas he
endows the characters with laconic, minimalist language and obsessive
motives: with Knobloch it is polygamy and erection problems, with Marta
the need to become a beautiful machine or virgin, with Knobloch's wife
a longing for her husband's return and inability to live with him.
Knobloch's small son bites people, and his colleague Havlena occupies
his mind with collecting vulgar nursery rhymes. It is not true,
therefore, that the miraculous syrup gives people some kind of energy,
it seems more probable that it sucks their zest for life out of them
like a vampire. There is probably no defence against this.
Director
Miroslav Krobot's original play Syrup is a special kind of dramatic
game which one almost wants to describe as some sort of new absurdity,
maybe even modern alienation. The play has neither a classic story nor
a conflict; everything that happens flows from the language of the
characters.
Richard Erml: Sirup lepí pocitem odcizení, Mladá fronta Dnes, 20. 12. 2002)
Syrup
is a play in the tradition of Czech absurd comedies, anchored in the
reality of every day whilst at the same time their heroes seem to move
in a special, surreal world.
Radmila Hrdinová: Všichni jsme systémy plovoucí v sirupu, Právo, 10. 1. 2003)