June 23 and 29 at 8:00 PM
Bohemian National Hall, 321 East 73rd Street.
Presented by: GOH Productions and Czech Center New York.
This production is free and open to the public. .
RSVP through Eventbrite is required. Info and reservations: https://www.rehearsalfortruth.org
Photos are available at: https://photos.app.goo.gl/rvNkkwB4kdUj98Hp9
Runs :60.

Czechoslovak-American Marionette Theatre will unveil a new marionette production of “Audience” by Vaclav Havel, translated and directed by Vit Horejs, June 23 and 29 at 8:00 PM in Bohemian National Hall, 321 East 73rd Street, as part of the 2021 Rehearsal for Truth Festival. The play, a dark comedy of spying in a brewery, will be staged with projected closeups of puppets from security cameras in order to suggest surveillance. In the last decade, such use of video has been employed to adapt marionette theater for large houses. The production’s concept is by Vit Horejs and Theresa Linnihan, who will act the play together. The 300-seat theater in Bohemian Hall, with socially-distanced seating for this production, is a good venue for this approach of mixing live performers, marionettes and projected live video.

Havel’s classic autobiographical play follows Ferdinand Vanek, a distinguished playwright forced to a life of manual labor in a brewery because his writings have been banned by the Communist regime. He is called into the bleak office of his boss, a brewmaster who habitually summons him for endless repetitions of dialogue amidst excess consumption of beer.  The writer must take part in a game of cat and mouse — pointless chat, clumsy interrogation, flattery, and alcohol consumption — with an implied threat of a more dire consequences: the loss of even such menial job or imprisonment. Tiresome bureaucracy and constant fear under Communism have driven the boss to alcoholism and stints of rage and despair, which are often turned upon his inferiors. One way out of Vanek’s predicament is for the writer to help his boss by writing weekly reports on himself, which he refuses to do, further offending his superior by mentioning his “principles.”

Vit Horejs will play Vanek and Theresa Linnihan will play the Brewmaster. Production design is by Alan Barnes Netherton. Production Stage Manager is Hjordis Linn-Blanford. Marionettes are by Milos Kasal and Jakub “Kuba” Krejci. Costumes and the Vanek marionette are by Theresa Linnihan. Producer is  Bonnie Sue Stein/GOH Productions.