“The next Berlin was the western part, and that was the turning point. Because there was an international pantomime festival there, where we met [Marcel] Marceau himself in the flesh. Mary Wigwam was one of the judges, a well-known dancer, it was under the auspices of big celebrities, and we performed our, I think it was... I’m not sure if it was Nine Hats to Prague [Devět klobouků na Prahu - trans.], I don’t think so, I think it was Etudes and The Trip [Cesta - trans.]. And we enjoyed great success, the word spread that Fialka’s people are good, that we have class, and after that Marceau treated us like colleagues on an equal level. That was the turning point, back in West Berlin... Akademie der Kunste was the name of the place where we played... Well, we grew a lot there, that was us, we came back from Berlin and we were fabulous! We were childish... But - and that was very interesting and very educational - we lived in East Berlin, but we performed in West Berlin! In other words, we boarded the underground in East Berlin, travelled through, and got out in West Berlin, and what a shock! The drab, tired, monochrome environment of the East compared to the vibrant West, with regard to the goods, the colours, the lights - that was quite an experience!”
“Another decisive performance was in the courtyard of the Klementinum in 1956, where we danced already as the pantomime group - well, danced, performed - as the pantomime group of Ladislav Fialka. I remember mainly, because we played it there, and that was Fialka’s concept, idea, and arrangement, it was called Sailors. It was a wooden stage platform, about one-and-a-half by two metres, or thereabouts, with a kind of palm tree. It was very primitive, very simple. In front of this platform we had a vertical prop, shaped and painted as waves. Well, and that’s where I emerged for the first time as a mermaid luring the Pierrot, which was Fialka, standing on the stage with Jirka Kaftan, in search of rescue, of a steamboat that might pass by. Well, and they did all kinds of buffoonery, and the steamboat moved along on a little wheel in the background, everything was terribly primitive. The steamboat passed them by with its slow movement, and they waited and waved at the next steamer. And then it ended when I managed to lure the Pierrot, that is, Fialka, down into the sea, and he dived down to join me in the waves.”
“We were woken by a terrible racket, sometime around four or five in the morning - tanks! Russian tanks driving up Nerudova Street. So that’s what woke us up in the night from 20 to 21 August 1968. We all wondered how to react, what to do, what it meant for us, whether to emigrate or stay, and so on... We already had a tour organised in Switzerland, a whole series [of performances - trans.], so the question was whether to go on the tour or not. We did in the end, by which I mean to say that we decided that our reaction would be to honour our agreement and to go perform in Switzerland. But Fialka and I travelled to see Samuel Beckett in Paris. He lived in La Sainte Street, I think, a magnificent street, on a high floor. We looked out of his window at La Sainte Prison, where the inmates walked round in circles, down below. And basically he said... In that sense it was very human, a lot of commiseration... not commiseration, but an understanding of the situation, the bad situation that had occurred here. So he looked at us, allow me to give a rough summary: ‘You decide yourselves if you will stay, that’s a personal matter.’ So he didn’t say: You’ll be miserable at home, stay here - no no. Fialka was dismayed, he said we wanted to know what, whether... well, simply that we had to work it out for ourselves.”
“Railings [Na Zábradlí] Theatre belonged to the Enlightenment Committee, and there was one great non-comrade lady there, an official who rooted for the project, and Doctor Vladimír Vodička. And things got rolling, Jiří Suchý was to be there, Jiří Srnec’s Black Light Theatre as well, all this was up for debate, and it was that much had to be done for it. And the much meant more than just washing the stairs and preparing things physically. Richard Weber decorated the place manually, by himself, it was cold, I can see him inching along with his stepladder to paint another strip of Railings Theatre. He painted it from the bottom up to the first balcony, with his great passion. So people knew it was in the works and that it would succeed, and it did, it was prepared so that about 9 December, I’m not sure exactly, 1958, If A Thousand Clarinets [was premiered - trans.]. Ljuba Hermanová in all her glory, If A Thousand Clarinets, there was the role of a dancer, and that was me, I took turns with Lída Kovářová, whom I’d worked with from the start.”
“We were - now, when I realise it, and it also pertained to both Grossman and Havel, everyone who was somehow connected to the play - focused on the pantomime, so we reckoned that they were doing their thing and we were doing ours. And we’re doing it well, and so are they, so it wasn’t that big a deal. I remember him, he was a stage hand there, he pulled... And then they started playing his plays there, so we kind of - how are you doing, the usual run of things. But we never entered the political or spiritual or ideological level, I never conversed with him [in that way - trans.]. But what I do remember very well, and that was when they were already out to get him: I got on the metro, Dejvická Station, I always got on at Dejvická, it’s a huge underpass, so you can get it at the Roundabout [Vítězné Square - trans.] or from the direction of Bořislavka, so I got on the train and made my way to Václav. And he was charming and said: ‘Watch out, you’ll get in trouble.’ And so he stopped, and I stared at him... That was a very strong moment, when he said: ‘That girl better not do anything stupid, she’ll get into trouble.’”
Zdeňka Kratochvílová was born on 14 November 1936 in Prague. Her family lived in a villa in Hanspaulka, her father was a lawyer and her mother was a housewife. After 1948 the family was forced to take in lodgers. Her father fell ill from the strain of the political upheaval, and the family was provided for by her mother, who worked as an accountant. Zdeňka graduated from dancing at a conservatoire, and she and other of her classmates joined the pantomime group of Ladislav Fialka. They presented their first production, Námořníci (Sailors), in the courtyard of the Klementinum in Prague in 1956. When their leader Fialka returned from military service, the group was a founding party of Na Zábradlí (Railings) Theatre, together with other young artists, such as Jiří Suchý, Jiří Srnec, Richard Weber, or Ivan Vyskočil. For the theatre’s first performance, Kdyby tisíc klarinetů (If A Thousand Clarinets), Zdeňka Kratochvílová played the role of a dancer. Fialka’s pantomime group found its home at Na Zábradlí Theatre, and it grew and developed. Success was soon to follow - the group made a name for itself at the international pantomime festivals in West Berlin and London. Zdeňka Kratochvílová married Ladislav Fialka in 1969, but the marriage did not last long. After the divorce Zdeňka gradually stopped working at Na Zábradlí and began performing with a figure of her own design - Animuk (Notaword) the Clown. Together with her former Na Zábradlí colleague, the director Lída Engelová, she founded the Pocket Theatre, which produced children’s plays. Their home scene was the theatre hall of the publishing house Albatros. They also toured abroad. They collaborated with the actor Ladislav Mrkvička, who played Animuk’s opposite, Anikrok (Notastep) the Clown. From the mid-1970s She taught at the Prague Conservatoire and later also at DAMU, the Theatre Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague, where she continues to teach at the Department of Authorial Creativity and Pedagogy. Zdeňka Kratochvílová passed away on March, the 22nd, 2024.
