Rehearsal for Truth Theater Festival: Present Perfect at Bohemian National Hall

Set in a museum of our collective memory, the play’s design invites the audience to explore a collection featuring valuable artifacts that commemorate alternative versions of key historical moments. Even with the guidance of the performers, it is, however, hard to determine which events are important, which are good to remember, and which are better to forget. The space slowly transforms into a bizarre “rage room” where events of the distant past return to the contemporary and forgotten history pervades current affairs.

Present: Perfect examines rupture points between dominant images and alternative ones, from Byzantine soldiers charged with removing the portrait of Christ from the Bronze Gate to Suffragette attacks on art in British galleries and today’s activists tearing down colonial statues throughout the West. Alongside the fanatical iconoclasts who uncompromisingly destroy all signs of a hostile ideology, a parallel crowd of equally fanatical iconoclasts defends the existing symbols to their last breath.

Present: Perfect (2021), Czech Republic. Created, designed and directed by: Jan Mocek. Performed by: Tinka Avramova, Irina Andreeva. Music: Matous Hekela. Dramaturgy: Tana Svehlova. Lighting design: Vaclav Hruska.

Running time: 75 min. Language: English. Use of stroboscope.

The performance is followed by a talkback.

Free and open to the public. Suggested donation $10. Seats are limited, on first-come, first-served basis. Online registration through Eventbrite is required.

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The 2023 Rehearsal for Truth Theater Festival: Anew is organized by the Vaclav Havel Library Foundation and the Bohemian Benevolent and Literary Association in partnership with the Polish Cultural Institute New York, GOH Productions, Trap Door Theatre, Centre of Jewish Culture ŠTETL, Jan Mocek, Martin E. Segal Theatre Center, Palissimo Company, and Romanian Cultural Institute.

The program is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature. The festival is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, Arts and Theatre Institute in Prague, and Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic.