Prague Notes

Last night I went to a small theater for an usual but brilliant play, Chaplinův Proces, or Chaplin's Trial. The following is from the writer/director, Miřenka Čechová, who actually played the lead last night.

Chaplin´s Trial

An existential nonverbal slapstick bringing together two great artists who knew how to expose the absurdity of the world – Charlie Chaplin and Franz Kafka – with a live blaring punk concert peeling the plaster and exposing what should have remained concealed.

In this production by Spitfire Company, Josef K. – the harrowed protagonist of Kafka's The Trial, an archetype representing us all, someone who can and probably will be eaten by the System – is replaced by a kind of Everyman in whom we gradually identify the features of Chaplin. The upstanding man is replaced by an anarchist, blind faith in truth succumbs to reality. At times skeptical, at times exceedingly idealistic, contradictory, alternating aspects of ordinary human existence with a slight dose of hyperbole.

Chaplin was no random choice, of course. His life and work sufficiently justify his role as an adversary to the System, a defender of the "discriminated majority." And The Trial, this "metaphor for the battle against worldly individualism," offers the performance a timeless story whose antihero could be anyone at anytime.

First, it was different. No "real" dialogue. Some words, here and there, but mostly gibberish or made up words (or from a language with which I am not familiar), so it was much like a silent film. It was extremely physical and abstract but even with my limited knowledge of Kafka and Chaplin, I was able to generally follow along. I admit that I have not read as much Kafka as I probably should and most of what I know about Chaplin, I know from the biography about his life that I saw many years ago. That being said, I have always been moved by the way that Kafka wrote about totalitarianism. Watching last night, the scholarly part of my brain kicked into high gear and I started thinking about Foucault's subject formation and the power of the panopticon, and self-censorship. What I found most powerful, though, is the lead being played by a woman. If I understand correctly, she filled in for a man who was the lead previously. I cannot imagine the role being played by a man. I am looking at this through a post-socialist perspective and maybe I am adding a layer. During the Soviet era, men were emasculated while women were masculinized, in many ways. By having a woman, not only be created as a subject of the system but to also have her become a man, an androgynous character was even more powerful for me. In one scene, she is trying to prove that she is a woman although she looks like a man – or at least that was my interpretation. The punk music was perfectly suited to the genre and added a raw, industrial feel to the play. Overall, I thought it was brilliant and while I know that I did not get it all and it is the type of theater that I don't usually attend, I was wow'ed and glad that I went. The Czechs are known for doing different and innovative theater; I'm glad that I am getting a chance to experience it.