Passion and Politics in Diego de Brea and Jakub Čermák’s "Edward II": Marlowe’s Controversial History on Czech Stages

Ivona Mišterová; Filip Krajník

doi:10.18778/2083-8530.28.12

Authors

Ivona Mišterová University of West Bohemia, Czech Republic https://orcid.org/0009-0008-5461-8953
Filip Krajník Masaryk University, Czech Republic https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8885-645X

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/2083-8530.28.12

Keywords:

Christopher Marlowe, 'Edward II', Czech Republic, Slovenia, Diego de Brea, Jakub Čermák, Elizabethan theatre, LGBT theatre, queer theatre

Abstract

The present article outlines the stage history of Christopher Marlowe’s history Edward II on Czech stages, focusing chiefly on how the respective directors approached the titular character of Marlowe’s play and his sexuality. The study focuses on two post-2000 productions of the play: Diego de Brea’s Edvard Drugy for the Slovenian National Theatre, which toured to the 16th “Divadlo” International Theatre Festival in Pilsen, West Bohemia, in 2008; and Jakub Čermák’s production of Edvard II. for the independent Czech theatre company “Depresivní děti touží po penězích” (Depressive Children Yearn for Money) that premiered in 2023 in Prague. Since for both Czechs and Slovenians, King Edward II is a minor figure of English history and Elizabethan history plays are generally less appealing to them than other genres, both the directors sideline the political dimension of the story to fully explore the issue of social and sexual norms and relate it to current social and cultural discussions both in the West and the former Eastern Bloc. Stressing the motif of social and sexual otherness even more bravely than most recent Western productions, de Brea and Čermák offered not only valuable contributions to both local and global reception of Marlowe’s Edward II, but also raised the visibility of LGBT theatre in a region where it has only a modest history and tradition.

Author Biographies

Ivona Mišterová, University of West Bohemia, Czech Republic

is head of the Department of English Language and Literature at the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen, Czechia. Her research interests include Shakespearean adaptations for children and young adults, reception studies, and the cultural impact of British and American theatre (not only) in Czechia. She has published extensively on these topics, exploring Shakespearean translations and adaptations, as well as the performances of British and American works staged in Czech theatres during the 20th and 21st centuries. Notable publications include Anglo-American Drama on Pilsen Stages (2013) and Inter Arma non Silent Musae: English and American Drama on Czech and Moravian Stages during the Great War (2017), which provide insights into the intersection of literature, culture, and performance history.
Filip Krajník, Masaryk University, Czech Republic

teaches early English literature at the Department of English and American Studies, Faculty of Arts, Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic. Together with a broad team of researchers, he is currently finishing a project on English Restoration theatre as a trans-national and multi-genre phenomenon. Together with Anna Hrdinová, he is also completing an edited volume on late 17th- and early- 18th-century English theatre, entitled Restoration Reshaping: Shifting Forms, Genres and Conventions in English Theatre, 1660-1737 (to be published by Karolinum in 2024). He has published on late medieval English poetry, Renaissance and Restoration theatre and the reception of Shakespeare in Central Europe. His translation of Shakespeare’s Hamlet into Czech premiered in 2022 at South Bohemian Theatre in České Budějovice, Czech Republic (directed by Jakub Čermák), followed a year later by a premiere of his translation of Marlowe’s Edward II by “Depresivní děti touží po penězích” in Prague, Czech Republic (also directed by Jakub Čermák).

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