Narodni Divadlo

10 November 2007

Früling Erwachen

The ‘National Theatre’ is part of a complex of theatres in the heart of the old town in Prague. It is also owned by the same owners as the Stavovske Divadlo and Divadlo Kolowrat, so their box office and schedules are interconnected. The theatre in which I attended this German play is another neo-renaissance design by Zítek and Schulz. The decorum was similar, although there were fewer mirrors, and the circulation spaces were more comfortable than the Rudolfinum. The building was opened briefly in 1881 and attacked two months later by a fire that pushed back the construction schedule 2 years.

Going back to the fact that this venue shares a joint box office with two others, I still can not figure out why they let me in to see this show. My ticket was actually for the ballet in the Stavovske Divadlo that night, yet the beautiful box seat I booked was available in the Narodni Divadlo that night. None of the ushers read the name of the show on my ticket and I was shown to box 14 anyway, still expecting to see a ballet. Once the constructivist set was revealed, I started doubting that I was in the right place; by the time I heard German being spoken onstage I was certain.

The show was top notch, surely benefiting from the wonderful space. The actors were able to go without microphones because the acoustics of the space were that good. The director gained a lot of flexibility from using a handful of boxes along either side for lighting and converting the pit elevator into a shallow pool. I can’t recall being in a proscenium theater and feeling like it was this flexible ever before.