Past Repertoire

“LITTLE PRINCE”

This black-light performance by the Ta Fantastika Prague Theatre is based on one of the most famous works of modern world literature – Antoine de Exupéry’s “Little Prince”. The Little Prince comes to our planet from a mysterious place in the universe, to meet the author of our story somewhere in the desert and reveal the secret of his remarkable life’s journey to him. It is a metaphorical story of love, responsibility, attitudes to life and interpersonal relationships. Meeting the Little Prince is actually like meeting the better part of ourselves, the good that is in each of us. The wonderful original music by Michal Pavlíček, one of the most outstanding contemporary Czech composers, the costumes and production by Richard Maška and the impressive filmed sections, together with black-light and magic lantern effects, will give each of you a unique and unforgettable cultural experience.

“OLD PRAGUE LEGENDS – FRANZ KAFKA IN GOLDEN PRAGUE”

The life of Franz Kafka took place in the unbelievably small space of Prague’s Old Town, the spirit of which greatly influenced him. This performance uses black-light effects to visualise the mental world of the world-famous writer, the numerous events of his life, the atmosphere of the period and the cultural influences that affected his mental state.

Franz Kafka is a lone walker who tries to get from the Old Town, embodying everything that is dragging him down, to Prague Castle, symbolising the castle in the clouds of his dreams. He therefore tries to cross Charles Bridge, which links the two banks of the Vltava: the bank of reality and the bank of the impossible. He walks against the tide, in which modern visitors to Prague mix with historical figures, Kafka’s contemporaries, and the heroes of Prague legends which fed Kafka’s imagination. The people he meets return him to the past. Caught by his fate and waging a constant, yet hopeless battle against this stream of people, he eventually tires and falls to the ground. However, the metamorphoses around him continue. All this takes place within a fantastic world rendered by the magic of black-light theatre, without words, using only magnificent music, the magic lantern, large-screen projections and black-light effects.

“GARDEN OF EARTHLY DELIGHTS”

Visual, artistic theatre based on the paintings by Hieronymus BOSCH.

The situation in which the human race has found itself over the centuries: today, during the Thirty Years’ War, under fascist and communist dictatorship – love, anxiety, hope, sensuality, eroticism, happiness and terror – all this is reflected in the paintings by the ingeniously farsighted Dutch painter Hieronymus BOSCH (around 1450 – 1516).

This is expressed not only by his paintings – his life is also a remarkable metaphor for human fate in the world. We know he married a rich woman to obtain economic independence and the opportunity to work freely. We also know that in the end his wife ran off to join the Adamites and that he remained alone, experiencing the images of his paintings. At the end of his life, tired and alone, he regularly met a nun in a convent...

Our story is based on these facts – it is a story of destructive foresight, a split personality, the Calvary of a creative man in the middle of the world, a story inspired by Bosch’s triptych PARADISE – THE GARDEN OF EARTHLY DELIGHTS – APOCALYPSE.

The means that are used in this performance are primarily the naked human body, song, music, and artistic, moving pictures. For a moment we leave the language of black velvet and luminescent lights, because the aim of this performance is not an illusion or an excellent optical effect. We want to put a picture in motion, to breathe life into the fantastic and transcendental art of Hieronymus Bosch and give a new dimension to his large triptych, which hangs in the Prado Gallery in Madrid.

The design by leading Czech painter Josef Jíra, the music by Ondřej Soukup, which marries the madrigals of Monteverdi with excerpts from Carmina Burana by Carl Orff, projections of the painter’s internal world contrasting with his surroundings – all of this and the concluding Pieta almost dazzles the senses, but also presents the “eternal comedy of life, which is passing.”

“DON QUIXOTE”

The extraordinary adventures of the legendary Don Quixote, the sad knight, and his servant Sancho Panza, this time on a journey to the last entrance “to the planet Venus”.

A romantic tragicomedy about the most famous hardships of the incorrigible dreamer, constantly driven by his inner desire to search for a distant star.

The unique techniques of the TA FANTASTIKA Theatre are mixed with attractive comedy, black-light theatre, visual effects, projections, sound, light, music and dance. They offer the opportunity to break the bounds of reality and take the audience to the imaginary world of Don Quixote – a world of dreams, fantasy, and the ideals of honour and pride. It is a celebration of mental indomitableness and the ability to hang on to ideals despite repeated battles with “windmills”. A time without scruples, without respect, creating violence, produces its own new heroes who attack the audience with their aggressive illusions and win admiration. Is there any room left for the aging, laughable, old-fashioned Don Quixotes, Baron Münchhaussens, Casanovas and so on?

Old man Quixote, discarded with distaste, feels he is no longer needed and thinks that he has been losing his mythical life as the centuries passed. But the animal stubbornness of Sancho Panza frees Don Quixote from his melancholy thoughts and gives him a new strength. At this moment there is a new reason to live, to fight for something, to dream of something, to convince someone.

The world still needs Don Quixote and people infected by the “virus” of fantasy, love and the undying battle against “windmills”.

Absolutely everybody has their dream, their Dulcinea...!

“MAGIC FANTASY”