Adam Stewart: Many Czechs don’t believe Cimrman plays could possibly work in English
Englishman Adam Stewart is the founder and artistic director of the Prague Youth Theatre, a thriving company bring together around 200 children and teenagers from dozens of different nations in the Czech capital. He is also a leading member of the Cimrman English Theatre; it performs plays “by” the much-loved Czech comedic character Jára Cimrman to English-speaking audiences and recently celebrated 10 years of existence. I spoke to Stewart at the PYT’s offices in the Vršovice district.
What first brought you to Prague, Adam?
“I had been part of youth theatres growing up, since I was six years old.”
“I’ve been here 19 years – 20 years next year.
“I visited for a week with a friend whose brother lived here; he was teaching English out in Prague. We met one him night in a bar and he spoke incredibly highly of the city and about how much he loved the city and how much he loved his job and the standard of living here.
“I had fallen in love with the city over the five days – and went home, packed in my job and moved out here a few months later.”
When did you begin the Prague Youth Theatre? What was the idea behind it?
“I had been part of youth theatres growing up, since I was six years old I’d been part of local youth theatres in my hometown, and I got so much from it.
“I’d been teaching English and didn’t love doing that. I was teaching at an international school, I was teaching drama, and I thought there was a gap in the market.
“I thought there were enough English-speaking young people who would be interested in a youth theatre and so 13 years ago I set it up.
“We started at Divadlo Kampa, we had about 25 kids, and over the years we’ve grown to currently 200 students, aged from five to 18.”
What are the five-year-olds doing?
“The five-year-olds do the same kind of stuff as the 18-year-olds.
“So we meet every Saturday for our performance courses and the idea is that we’re always working towards a performance.
“That’s what I did when I was at youth theatre. We would rehearse – yes, we’d play some drama games and do some improve activities – but in general we were always working towards a performance.
“So as the 18-year-olds work towards a performance, the five-year-olds do. The plays that we pick for the five-year-olds are very different to the plays we pick for 18-year-olds, but they do the same thing, they work towards a final performance.”
So that’s the best way to teach kids acting, actually staging a play?
“That’s always been my focus. I think the process is just as important as the performance.
“So one week we do mime, the next week we do physical theatre; I think, however, that from rehearsing the play they learn to work as a group, for non-native English-speakers they’re practising their English skills, and I think they need to work towards something, whether it be in our exam courses, when they work towards an acting exam, or in our performance courses, when they work towards a final performance.
“And they’re picking up those different theatre skills, acting skills, through the work they’re doing to prepare for the performance.”
Who are the kids? Are many of them from international backgrounds? Or are most of them Czech?
“We did a count recently and I think we have about 45 different nationalities. And a mixture recently. The majority of our students are Czechs, who may go to international schools, or they may come from a bilingual background.
“But we have kids from the US, the UK, all over Europe, Italy, Spain, Scandinavia.
“I’m not sure in terms of which of those go to international schools, but I think it’s probably around 50 percent are international school kids and the other 50 percent go to local Czech schools here and have a good level of English and so are able to access what we’re offering.”
What’s your main sense of what they actually get out of being part of the Prague Youth Theatre?
“What we’ve always tried to do, when we were much smaller and even as we’ve got bigger, is certainly to try to keep a kind of a family atmosphere.
“As well as the obvious – confidence, the English language skills they’re gaining – I think what I’ve found is that when you’ve got kids, particularly perhaps the expat kids, from all different backgrounds, all different schools, and some of them get into those expat bubbles.
“It’s an opportunity for them to meet kids from other backgrounds, kids from other cultures, kids from other countries.
“So I think that is one of the things I’m most proud of: We have young people in the Youth Theatre who would never have known each other if it wasn’t for what we’re offering.
“I always wanted to make sure the students performed in professional theatres, because that’s a skill in itself.”
“So for me that’s really lovely to see. Along with, of course, as I mentioned, the confidence and language skills.
“Also we have kids who just want to perform and may want to go to drama school and may want to continue this in further life, and they’re getting something different from it.
“But it’s great to see the camaraderie and the fun. We have a lot of fun in the sessions.”
When you talk about staging plays, typically are they performed? What theatres do you use?
“From very early on I always wanted to make sure that the students performed in professional theatres, because I think that’s also a skill in itself, getting used to working under the stage lights and in a professional theatre; you’re having to project your voice because you’re on a stage and there’s an audience in front you.
“We often find it difficult to find theatres, because there’s so much going on in Prague, there’s so much theatre already, and those theatres are often booked up.
“We use Divadlo Na Prádle often. We work with our friends at Prague Shakespeare Company. We’re using Divadlo Kolowrat in December. We’ve used D21, which is a fantastic, flexible venue in the centre of Prague.
“We had a student a few years ago take a large role in The Zookeeper’s Wife.”
“We try as much as possible, particularly with our older students, to find interesting spaces to perform. We’ve performed in gothic cellars, we’ve performed in coffee shops, we even did The Canterbury Tales a few years ago in a hospoda, in a pub, so we try to find interesting spaces.
“But Divadlo Na Prádle has been somewhere we’ve been using for quite a few years and we’ve been very happy there.
“But it’s great for those young people to be able to experience actually performing on a professional stage.”
What are the plays that you perform? Are they typically from the UK, or the States? Where do you find your material?
“Typically British plays – most often they are British plays. We have done some plays from the US before.
“A lot of our plays that we perform with our older students are from an anthology of plays called National Theatre Connections.
“Every year the National Theatre in London invites very well-known playwrights to write plays specifically for young people, so a lot of our plays we pick from those, because they are socially relevant for young people, they are written specifically for young people so they can get a lot out of those plays.
“For our younger groups we use a British website called Lazy Bees, where we get age-appropriate plays, sometimes musicals.
“And we’ve got to the stage now, after 13 years, where if there’s a play that we’ve done five or six years ago that we’ve enjoyed, we’ll also do that.
“An Irish youth theatre provide a great play share resource and we get a lot of our plays from there.
“Really for me, it’s plays that are written specifically for young people, so that they can actually identify with the plays we’re performing.”
But do the older ones, say those who are 17 or 18, tackle anything more difficult, like Shakespeare?
“Yes, we’re currently working on Metamorphosis, the Ovid, we’ve done Shakespeare – we did Macbeth a couple of years ago, we’ve also done A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
“We also have a PYT+ group, which is for our older students who are interested in perhaps taking it further. They did the Complete Works of William Shakespeare, abridged, last year and they’re currently working on The Bible: The Complete Word of God, abridged.
“So yes, we have worked on some difficult stuff. We did a selection of Grimms’ tales last December.
“We have tackled some difficult stuff, and also some plays that have quite difficult subject matter, so we don’t shy away from those kinds of plays, for sure.”
When you say it’s up to the age of 18, are some of the kids sad when they have to leave?
“Yes, they are. That’s one of the reasons why we have PYT+; we’ve got a couple of 20-year-olds in that group.
“Yes, they are sad, and it’s great to see them. I’m still in touch with a lot of the students, some of them 28, 29, who I taught 10 years ago.
“They are sad, because, as I said before, we are really close, we are like a family, and some of their best friends are people from Prague Youth Theatre.
“So they do get sad and they often come back and visit. I’ll often get messages on Facebook saying, I’m here, I’m back in Prague, can we have a beer.
“It’s lovely to see some of my old students again and we do try and keep in touch.”
Do you have a sense that some parents are quite ambitious for the kids who attend?
“You do get some parents, yes. I think a lot of the parents see the benefits. And I think, certainly for some of the younger children, their parents may send to gain confidence or improve language skills, but there are some who do have high hopes for some of our students.
“Many Czechs don’t believe Cimrman plays could possibly work in English.”
“With the older students, they choose to come themselves and that can be for very, very different reasons.
“I would say probably the majority of our students aren’t interested in taking it further, in terms of a career. But we do have some parents who have high hopes and we deal with that.
“We tend to do plays that are very much ensemble-based, in order to give every young person the opportunity to shine as much as possible.”
So there are no two-handers?
“[Laughs] There are no two-handers, no.”
Obviously a lot of movies and TV series are made here in Prague. Are your students getting roles in those?
“They are, yes. We work very closely with a lot of the casting agencies here in Prague and we had a student a few years ago take a large role in [the film] The Zookeeper’s Wife.
“But a lot of our students have had various roles in different films that have been done here.
“And also we work closely with some of the film schools here: FAMU and Prague Film School. It’s a great way for these young people to get experience of doing film and television without perhaps the same pressures that they might get working for a big Hollywood movie.
“Yes, we have a lot of students working for various films here.”
You’re also an actor yourself. Have you been in big movies?
“I have not been in any big movies. I did a TV show called Crossing Lines many years ago.
“But, no, I much prefer teaching rather than acting. The only acting I currently do is with Cimrman English Theatre, which I’ve been with since the very beginning, 10 years ago.
“But no, my real passion is in teaching rather than acting.”
I saw you performing with the Cimrman English Theatre a few weeks ago, when you had a special event marking 10 years of the theatre. For those who don’t know, it’s an English version of a theatre based on plays supposedly written by this “genius” Czech comedic character Jára Cimrman, and the concept dates back to the 1960s. How did you first get involved with the Cimrman English Theatre?
“The Cimrman English Theatre was founded by my uncle, Brian Stewart. He had been visiting me while I was here and had come to see some of the plays that I’d been performing here.
“He had a Czech girlfriend who introduced him to Jára Cimrman and he had this great idea and he began to translate Záskok, The Stand-In, to start with. And he asked me if I knew any local actors who might be interested in getting involved.
“So I was kind of instrumental at the beginning, putting the troupe together, and I’ve been there ever since.
“It’s a group of friends and local actors, and we absolutely love doing these plays – it’s so much fun.”
Typically how do Czechs respond when you tell them that you’re part of the Cimrman English Theatre, or even when they find out that the theatre exists? Many Czechs don’t even know that it exists.
“That’s absolutely true, there are many who don’t. As we have found for the last 10 years, many Czechs don’t believe it could possibly work in English.
“Our response is, Well, come and see, and then make up your own mind.
“A lot of them don’t know that it exists and they’re always astounded and ask, Does it really work in English?
“From our experience of having Czech audiences we feel it does, and I always try to get them to come along. I give them a couple of free tickets and tell them to experience it themselves.”
And you’ve also got a new play, your fifth or sixth?
“Our sixth, yes. We premiered it a couple of weeks ago. That is The Long, Wide and Short-sighted, a fairy tale.
“It was a great night a couple of weeks ago when we premiered it. We’ve got another performance on November 22, which is sold out, which is great news.
“And then next year we’re going to do the entire cannon, because it’s our 10th anniversary. We’ll do every single play over six months, so we’re excited about that.”
“We realise how precious the plays of Jára Cimrman are.
What do you personally get from being a part of that theatre? Given that it’s so loved by Czechs, it’s such a part of Czech culture, do you feel like you kind of understand Czechs a bit better from doing it?
“Yes, I think so, perhaps Czech humour. I’m from Britain and I think there are a lot of similarities with Czech and British humour – a kind of darkness and absurdity, perhaps.
“It’s an honour to perform these plays. It’s always been an honour. I think all of us completely understand the weight of what it is we’re doing and how important it is to the Czechs and how we have to try to perform it as closely to the original as we possibly can, but also be very understanding of how important it is.
“We have people who come to see it and it’s so important to them, they’ve grown up with it, so we realise how precious the plays of Jára Cimrman are.
“But I’ve been here for a long time, so I’d like to think I kind of understand the Czechs. But it’s certainly helped me to understand their humour a lot more, I think.”
One thing that surprised me at the 10th anniversary event was how it seemed like the majority of the audience were Czechs.
“It’s difficult for us to tell. We did have some feedback forms for a while, but it’s to tell.
“It gives people the opportunity to be able to introduce their non-Czech partner to the genius that is Jára Cimrman.”
“We do have a lot of hardcore fans who come to see a lot of our plays, and come again and again, which is great; we thank them so much for their support.
“And they are Czechs. I think what’s great is – and I think that we mentioned this at the 10th anniversary – that it gives an opportunity for Czechs who perhaps have non-Czech partners.
“They’ve been telling them all their lives, Oh, you must understand Cimrman to understand the Czechs.
“And it gives them the opportunity to be able to introduce their non-Czech partner to the genius that is Jára Cimrman.”
Also I noticed from the website of the Prague Youth Theatre that a couple of your teachers here are also members of the Cimrman English Theatre.
“Yes. Kevin [Quis], who’s one of our acting teachers, joined the troupe a year ago, he started with our [play] The Pub in the Glade, and now he’s got the role of Goldilocks in The Long, Wide and Short-sighted.
“He’s a great young actor. We’re trying to get in younger people, because the average age of the Cimrman English Theatre is quite high; we’re trying to get in some younger actors, to continue for as long as we possibly can.”
Again about the Prague Youth Theatre, looking to the future do you have any major plans, or anything you’d like to achieve?
“This year we’ve just expanded. We were teaching three groups every Saturday and now we’ve expanded to four groups and taken on an extra teacher.
“What we’ve found was very important is, as we grew, the class sizes were getting quite large and we’re trying to bring in extra teachers to make sure we keep those groups to a good size, so that every kid gets their opportunity to perform.
“I think at the moment, we’ve just expanded, we just want to keep on as we are really. More international exchanges would be great, and more and more performances and working with more and more young people here in Prague.
“And just to continue with what we’re doing. It seems to be going well and we have some great students and some great teachers working with us.”
