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Theater, Prague, History, and Storytelling. This Is My World

Theater
Hummingbird Stories

THEATER Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

My dad took me to the theater for the first time when I was eight. They were playing The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn – and although it’s been a little more than half a century, I remember it like it was yesterday. Not that particular production, but I remember the overwhelming feeling I got there. That emotion is called „love of theater,“ and it greatly influences and enriches my life. For more than half a century…

PRAGUE STORIES

The perception of beauty is individual. Therefore, it is impossible to say unequivocally that Prague is the most beautiful city in the world. However, if it isn’t, it’s undoubtedly one of the most beautiful. Prague used to be a major center of European politics, trade, education, and culture for many centuries. Its houses, churches, palaces, streets, courtyards, and squares are a living architecture textbook. Hidden in their walls and pavements are hundreds of stories worth telling.

Theater

In the mid-1990s, the Internet was at the very beginning of commercial use; Google or Netflix had just been created (and only in the next ten years was YouTube born), and the world began to discover DVDs. That’s when I thought it was a pity that if you want to see a recording of a theater performance, you have to wait for it to be recorded and broadcast by Czech Television. That’s how the project I called „Pearls of the Czech Theater at Your Home“ was born.

"Pearls of Czech Theater at Your Home"

Theater is „here and now“; there is no doubt about that. Nothing can fully replace the shared experience of the overflow of energy between the stage and the auditorium. However, if it is not possible to have a personal experience in the theater, the recording of the theater production is invaluable. We released recordings of about 50 theater productions, either in cooperation with Czech Television or those that we have filmed in our own production. More than half a million copies were sold, and we were almost a monopoly producer in this field. It was a beautiful time, and not only I remember it fondly.

About Theater

The rapid development of new technologies and the start of YouTube gradually pushed DVD to the sidelines. Because I really like to talk about theater, I founded the web portal About Theater. It’s not a theater newspaper nor a space for theater reviews – it’s a place to talk about theater. And the reason? Well, love for the theater of course. By the way – the publishing house that published DVDs with recordings of theater productions and which now runs the About Theater portal, I named Thespis in the mid-1990s. The inspiration for this was the Greek actor and playwright Thespis, considered the drama creator. Thespis lived in the 6th century B.C., and even then, he traveled with his cart from town to town. Theater is eternal, and you can talk about it endlessly…

Theater Documentaries​

Because we were the first in the Czech Republic to publish recordings of theater performances, we went pretty far in mapping Czech theater history. (Our oldest recording was Man from the Attic of the legendary Semafor Theater – Czech Television filmed it in 1962.) That is why we added interviews with actors, directors, dramaturgs, authors, translators, and theater directors to all the titles. It was very nice to listen to their memories. In addition to these short interviews (15-30 minutes long), we also filmed two full-length documentaries about the theater, which were so successful that Czech Television bought them to broadcast.

IUVENTA

Every tourist following Prague’s most frequented route – i.e., Karlova Street to the Charles Bridge – must notice this building. It’s a house full of muses and students that seems to belong to something other than this very commercial route – but thankfully, it is there. It is the seat of the Theatre Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts, one of the two Czech „theatre“ colleges. Years ago, we filmed twelve graduation productions of four years of those students. And we made two documentary films about one of them. (There were 15 students in the year, that’s why the films are called „Fifteen„.)

Two Queens

When I was seventeen, my grandma gave me Stefan Zweig’s Mary Stuart book. The story of two queens, Mary Stuart of Scotland and Elizabeth I of England, moved and excited me so much that I wrote a play inspired by Zweig’s book. You can read more about it on the Hummingbird Stories website or buy it in our e-shop. (If you are a theater producer, don’t buy anything and just write to me. I’ll be happy to send it to you.)

Cable Car

Coming soon. When it snows… 🙂

Hummingbird Stories

A few years ago, my friend Pavlina O`Toole, who has lived in Missouri for thirty years, and I said we would start a publishing house. We named it Hummingbird Stories ( E-SHOP).
Hummingbird because the hummingbird is a likable, skilled bird playing with all the colors typical of Missouri. And “stories”? Because our motto is: Publishing house Hummingbird Stories brings you STORIES – hidden in books, movies, theater productions, and journalistic genres. The form is arbitrary, determined by content, but it is always a story.

Kevin Alone in Prague

We decided that our first project will introduce Prague with a four-part film in the genre of feature documentary. The subtitle of the movie is Discover Prague, like never before. That’s because Prague is one of the most beautiful cities in the world, but it’s unnecessary to say that because everyone knows it. Our movie is the story of a thirteen-year-old boy, Kevin, from Missouri, who has an American father and a Czech mother. He came to Prague to get to know the land of his ancestors. How? After all, through the stories that are hidden in its walls and pavements which were waiting to be told.

Our Beautiful Prague

Thanks to its rich history, Prague is overflowing with stories. That is why we founded the web portal Our Beautiful Prague, where we gradually tell stories of the ancient past as well as relatively recent ones. We enjoy writing about stories of great love, whether it took place in the 16th or the beginning of the 20th century. About why Salvator Dali kissed the hands of a Czech sculptor. About the meditation garden and how it relates to state bankruptcy in the 17th century. Or about how the building of the Faculty of Law of Charles University is associated with the assassination of Hitler. About the only Cubist lamp in the world or about the house through which history walked and what connection it has to the Oscar-winning director Miloš Forman. Or about words, the meaning of which is hidden even to most Czechs – for example, what PRAMPOUCH is. Prague has a beautiful story at every corner. And the desire to talk about them is the same as the desire to talk about the theater.

Sweet Czech Cuisine

Czech cuisine has several typical dishes that cannot go without mentioning. Whether it’s open face sandwiches, potato latkes with garlic and marjoram, or fried cheese. Sweet dishes, which are served as a main course, are a separate chapter altogether. Starting and not ending with Czech buns, without which no traditional Czech fairy tale is complete.

The first part of our cookbook is dedicated to sweet dishes: fruit dumplings, both cottage cheese and yeast dumplings, crepes, enriched dough pancakes, noodles with poppy seeds, mini sweet rolls with vanilla cream, or another hero of the Czech fairy tale, semolina porridge. And that’s only half of the fantastic dishes that the classic of Czech cuisine, Václav Frič, cooked for our cookbook. What more could you ask for? (Apart from the other parts of the cookbook…)

Czech Christmas

Christmas, its traditions, customs, and emotions are an essential emotional anchor in every person’s life. Even more so if he finds his home elsewhere and remembers Christmas with a soul full of childish sentiment. That’s why we decided to publish a book about Czech Christmas, its traditions, fairy tales, and legends. And also a book full of recipes, both written and video recipes, for Christmas food and sweets, which will be cooked and baked for us by the guru of Czech cuisine, Václav Frič (in May 2024, awarded the Holder of the Traditions of Czech Cuisine award).

A Time To Cast Off

Domestic violence is a huge problem, made worse by the fact that many people either don’t realize they’re in a toxic relationship or don’t have the strength to leave it, plus the fact they don’t know how to. In the Czech Republic, a third of people, both women and men, have direct experience with domestic violence. And because the lack of information about this problem further leads to the suffering of many people who do not know how to free themselves, Pavlína O’Toole and her sister Kateřina Jenkins and I founded a non-profit organization for the prevention of domestic violence. We named it Čas Robinsonů (Time of the Robinsons), after the novel of the same name (in the English version A Time to Cast Off).

A Time to Cast Off

Pavlína O’Toole’s novel is the story of a Czech family living in the USA. The main character, Petra, is separated from her extended family and friends, which makes the situation all the easier for her abusive husband, Richard, who physically and mentally abuses her and their children.

Psychologist Dr. Martina Venglářová wrote in the foreword to the book: „The book is fiction that could become a textbook on domestic violence, about an insecure family background that raises up people who are insecure about themselves. They are on the side of victims and abusers, unfortunately. It’s about the importance of being aware of your surroundings and offering help.“

The story of Petra and her children is a happy ending. However, it was far from effortless. Petra had to find the strength to escape and defend her children. And that is precisely why the novel A Time to Cast Off was a great help and hope for many people struggling with this problem.

Anti-Marriage Counselling

In addition to publishing the novel A Time to Cast Off, we ran a website about preventing domestic violence, organized a lecture for students of technical universities, which we filmed and put on YouTube, mediated pro bono help from lawyers, or went to evangelical churches, where we talked to people after the mass about problems of domestic violence. 

The next project will be a theater play with the deliberately provocative title Anti-Marriage Counselling or a Comedy About Domestic Violence. The author of the text is again Pavlína O`Toole, and we are very much looking forward to the premiere.

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