The Black Monk

The Gin Game(en)

Weller Martin and Fonsia Dorsey, two elderly residents at a nursing home for senior citizens, strike up an acquaintance. Neither seems to have any other friends, and they start to enjoy each other's company. Weller offers to teach Fonsia how to play gin rummy, and they begin playing a series of games that Fonsia always wins. Weller's inability to win a single hand becomes increasingly frustrating to him, while Fonsia becomes increasingly confident. While playing their games of gin, they engage in lengthy conversations about their families and their lives in the outside world. Gradually, each conversation becomes a battle, much like the ongoing gin games, as each player tries to expose the other's weaknesses, to belittle the other's life, and to humiliate the other thoroughly.

Albert Einstein(cs)

Hamlet(cs)

The production of Shakespeare's Hamlet with František Němec in the title role (premiered at the Smetana Theatre in 1982) was far from enthusiastic at first. To some viewers, it seemed superficially unimpressive. On the spare stage of J. Svoboda, director M. Macháček focused on thinking through the relationships between the characters and their motivations, and cast great actors of the National Theatre in the roles. Macháček gradually revealed the story, like a detective story - from the message from the ghost of Hamlet's father about the manner of his death, through the play of the theatre company as proof of the murderer's guilt, to the final murderous finale... The production eventually became a Prague theatre hit and could certainly have been performed for a long time if it had not been withdrawn from the repertoire in 1988.

Der Hauptmann von Köpenick(de)

Each is dependent on the other. He breaks into the passport office to get a passport. He is surprised and ends up back in prison, where he is trained in military drill. After his release, he once again lodges with relatives, his sister and brother-in-law. Wearing a second-hand captain's uniform, he first takes over a guard unit and uses it to occupy Köpenick town hall, where all the employees of the town council submit to the supposed captain. The mayor is promoted to Berlin and Voigt presents himself to the authorities a few days later. At first, everyone present laughs at the prank, but then Voigt is made aware of the legal consequences. He is sent back to prison, but shortly afterwards he is pardoned by the Emperor.

Birds and Bees(en)

As explicit photos of the school’s ‘it’ couple go viral, and real-world consequences of online life spread, so do everyone’s opinions... Birds and Bees is a brand new play by award-winning writer Charlie Josephine exploring the complicated nature of teenage relationships using spoken word, physical theatre and a specially commissioned soundtrack.

Ztracený prsten(cs)

Manslaughter(es)

A police drama that chronicles the efforts of a police officer to uncover an unexplained murder case that blends the lives of two women and a theater actor, the victim of an "artistic" shot, part of a play.

The Goodbye Girl(en)

After being dumped by her live-in boyfriend, an unemployed dancer and her 10-year-old daughter are reluctantly forced to live with a struggling off-Broadway actor.

The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black, Black Oil(en)

In their songs, comedy and exuberant music, a travelling theatre company give a fiercely polemic account of Scottish history, from the aftermath of Culloden to the oil boom. Their production before a live audience is intercut with filmed reconstructions of the Highland Clearances and the Victorian obsession with hunting stags.

Ma nouvelle Héloïse(fr)

A wealthy Japanese patron, enamored with Rousseau, offers an atypical and versatile filmmaker the opportunity to freely adapt Jean-Jacques Rousseau's epistolary novel into a film. The filmmaker brings together three young actors in a deserted palace above Clarens and begins shooting. Rousseau's tragedy then reverberates through the contemporary characters.

As You Like It(en)

Witty, playful and utterly magical, the story is a compelling romantic adventure in which Rosalind and Orlando's celebrated courtship is played out against a backdrop of political rivalry, banishment and exile in the Forest of Arden - set in 19th-century Japan.

The Last Metro(fr)

In occupied Paris, an actress married to a Jewish theater owner must keep him hidden from the Nazis while doing both of their jobs.

Games of Love and Chance(fr)

A group of teenagers living in a housing project in the outskirts of Paris rehearse a scene from Marivaux's play of the same name. Krimo is determined not to take part, but after developing feelings for Lydia, he quickly assumes the main role and love interest in the play.

Marta(cs)

The life story of Marta Kubišová as a musical, broadcast live from the Summer Stage of the Kampa Museum in Prague, based on real events in the life of Marta Kubišová. On stage, we meet not only the two remaining Golden Kids, but also Jan Němec, Jan Moravec, Alexander Dubček, and Václav Havel.

The Taste of Others(fr)

Unpolished and ultra-pragmatic industrialist Jean-Jacques Castella reluctantly attends Racine's tragedy "Berenice" in order to see his niece play a bit part. He is taken with the play's strangely familiar-looking leading lady Clara Devaux. During the course of the show, Castella soon remembers that he once hired and then promptly fired the actress as an English language tutor. He immediately goes out and signs up for language lessons. Thinking that he is nothing but an ill-tempered philistine with bad taste, Clara rejects him until Castella charms her off her feet.

Henry V(en)

In the midst of the Hundred Years War, the young King Henry V of England embarks on the conquest of France in 1415.

The Flying Classroom(de)

A boy who was once a perpetual outcast finds friends in a new boarding school. United with his new peers, he gets involved in a heated rivalry with a group of students from a neighboring school.

Cyprus Avenue(en)

David Ireland's award-winning dark comedy about sectarian hatred in Northern Ireland. Eric Miller, a Belfast loyalist, mistakes his five-week-old granddaughter for Gerry Adams.

Gazdina roba(cs)

Gabriela Preissová wrote her two most famous dramas, Gazdina roba and Její pastorkyňa, when she was not yet thirty. Both were set to music and became famous. The first opera, entitled Eva, was written by J. B. Foerster, and the second by Leoš Janáček. The fame of Janáček's work greatly overshadowed the original. On the other hand, "Gazdina roba," the author's debut work, is still performed on Czech stages, regardless of the era. That is how powerful and impressive this drama is. The production by director Zdeněk Kaloč premiered at the Vinohrady Theater in May 1992. Dagmar Veškrnová endowed the title role of Eva the seamstress with warmth, temperament, pride, and tragic shadows.

Rushmore(en)

When a beautiful first-grade teacher arrives at a prep school, she soon attracts the attention of an ambitious teenager named Max, who quickly falls in love with her. Max turns to the father of two of his schoolmates for advice on how to woo the teacher. However, the situation soon gets complicated when Max's new friend becomes involved with her, setting the two pals against one another in a war for her attention.