The staging of Václav Havel’s plays at the Kašpar Theater has a long tradition, and it could be said that Havel actually belongs at Kašpar. He personally attended performances at the Celetná Theater, which he enjoyed very much, chatting with the actors after the show, and it was clear that he felt at home backstage. After almost eight years, we are returning to Havel at Kašpar with a spectacular project, staging his rarely performed play The Increased Difficulty of Concentration first in English in June and then in Czech in the fall. Šimon Dominik is directing both language versions, and the cast is also the same, with the exception of a few roles.
We are not a theater that particularly seeks out texts with political undertones; we focus more on social issues and powerful human stories, so even from Havel’s work, we tend to choose plays that are not „merely“ a reflection of the times and the regime of that era, but rather plays in which we see current relevance and whose themes we find timeless. Currently, our repertoire includes the so-called „Vaněk plays“ – Audience and Vernissage, which we perform together in one evening. In the past, we staged an evening called Na Havla, where we performed the plays Mistake, Audience, and The Increased Difficulty of Concentration in one evening.
We are now returning to the latter after many years in an unconventional project, in which we will first present the play in English and then add it to our repertoire in Czech in the fall. The English-language version will serve as a kind of summer special at the Celetná Theater, which, thanks to its location on a tourist artery in Prague, is an ideal place to see English-language plays, which are otherwise difficult for foreigners to find in Prague. We want to offer them a quality show and a powerful Czech playwright. Of course, we are not only targeting tourists; we hope to find an audience among foreigners living in the Czech Republic or students of English who want to experience English in a different way than just in textbooks or on television.
The name Václav Havel evokes an extraordinary response around the world; people know him mainly as a politician, dissident, and, in a way, a visionary. He is one of the most important figures in modern Czech history, and we would like to introduce him as a playwright whose work is among the most significant in Czech theater.
First night 24th of June 2025, Celetná Theatre.
Cast – Ondřej Novák, Tereza Slámová, Kateřina Zapletalová, Johana Koubová, Barbora Vyskočilová, Štěpán Coufal, Kryštof Kotek, Petr Halíček.
Translator Štěpán Šimek / Director Šimon Dominik / Set Design Karel Čapek / Costume Design Anna Hrušková / Music Petr Malásek / Dramaturgy Lenka Bočková / Language Consultant James Beaumont
