By Roman Sikora (Cz. Jako lvi, based on the play Tři dny)
Guest Performance by Lachende Bestien
Ein Stück: Tschechien – Festival for New Czech Theatre 2023
Sunday, 19th November, 2023 | 8 pm
Theater unterm Dach, Danziger Str. 101, 10435 Berlin
Tickets can be booked through Theater unterm Dach – follow this link.
The hero of this dark comedy is Herr M., a sly, ruthless banker who sells bad loans to his clients. When he loses all his property due to an accident and the medical treatment he undergoes as a result of it, he suddenly finds himself on the street, homeless. But even then, he continues to adhere to his belief in free-market economics, and founds a university to teach his fellow homeless people team-buidling and coaching. In this production, director Michal Hába dissects our society and reveals the inhumane capitalist principles that underlie it.
Writer: Roman Sikora
Director: Michal Hába
Stage and Costume Design: Adriana Černá
Dramaturg: Veronika Linka
Music: Jindřich Čížek
Performers: Kryštof Bartoš, Mark Kristian Hochman, Ondřej Jiráček, Jindřich Čížek
Premiere: 13.01.2023
In Czech with German surtitles. Followed by a talk with the artists.
Lachende Bestien
The Prague-based alternative theatre group Lachende Bestien was formed around director Michal Hába, musician Jindřich Čížek and set designer Adriana Černá in 2011. It is considered to be one of the most progressive theatre groups in Prague. The ensemble was founded in the Eliade Library of the
Divadlo Na zábradlí (On the banister Theatre) in Prague, where they presented their first production 120 Days of Freedom (Nová síť Award for performer Michal Hába), a variation on de Sade’s controversial novel, which dealt with the limits of imagination. This production became emblematic
of the group’s work, which aims to go “against the viewer’s guts” and invites active dialogue. Other important productions include the Czech premiere of Werner Schwab’s Pornogeographie (Josep Balvín Award) or the Havelian production Ferdinand! (Ferdinande!), following the spirit of Havel’s one-act plays in exploring the topic of the intellectual in the public sphere. In 2017, the company staged an adaptation of Bertolt Brecht’s The Good Woman of Setzuan, entitled SEZUAN (based on Brecht), in a grotesquely alienating style. Their repertoire mostly includes original projects, but they also adapt “traditional” theatre texts – such as Ibsen’s Enemy of the People (2019) or Roman Sikora’s Castle on the Loire (2020). The style of the Lachende Bestien company strongly relies on the music and live performances of composer and multi-instrumentalist Jindřich Čížek.
Lachende Bestien continue the tradition of Brechtian theater not only through their alienating style of acting, but especially with their analytical view of reality. In their projects, they explore and question the
idea of capitalism and take a programmatic approach to social inequality. The result of this is a socially critical and appealing theatre, full of self-irony and biting humour.
The group Lachende Bestien performs in Prague at the X10 Theatre.
Artistic Directors and Production Managers of the Ein Stück: Tschechien Festival:
Barbora Schnelle and Henning Bochert
Press: PR Augustin
A production by Drama Panorama: Forum für Übersetzung und Theater e. V. in collaboration with the Czech Centre Berlin, the Embassy of the Czech Republic in Berlin and the Theater unterm Dach Berlin, funded by the Governing Mayor of Berlin – Senate Chancellery, the Czech-German Fund for the Future and the Culture Ministry of the Czech Republic with the Národní plán obnovy programme.
