First Playwriting Festival!
After a lot of hard work, we are proud to finally present our playwriting festival.
Thank you to the amazing team for the hard work! This could not have been done without you! 🖤
The Visitor:
In a lonely, isolated world, people crave company more than junk food. Driven by the convenience of consumerism, the market for instant comfort has become widespread and easily accessible to all. The Visitor shows us our future, or perhaps even our realities. We follow the meetings between two regular people who are fighting loneliness in two different ways: losing their minds and losing themselves in the process. What would you do if you had no one in this world? Do you have anyone in this world? What does it mean to have someone? Do you need a visitor or will you become one?
City Love:
Bonmona wasn’t The City’s first name by any measure. Scholars, painstakingly piecing together the probable history of the area, note that first settlers established themselves around the river well before Christ. The settlement grew and changed, shedding its snake skin throughout the passing of time until the present-day form. Millenia of earthly existence allowed Bonmona to mature and develop its spirit. Humans fill The City’s vein-streets day in day out, giving it life. Swarming and busy, they pay little mind to the wholeness of their host. Lately though, Bonmona has gone unusually quiet, almost as if hibernating through a tough winter. The air is filled with persistent fear. There’s poison spreading through the blood, few stroll along the now-deserted streets. But there is an odd one among them. The omnipresent feeling doesn’t seem to oppress them. In fact, this one seems to be thriving during this time. Roaming around, not running errands or having a destination, but trying to reach out to The City itself. Seeking an audience.
Paper Planes:
Blue is a professional dreamer, and a poet.
She sends poems shaped as paper planes into her beloved Mr Hige’s yard, in hopes that he loves her. Mr Hige never responds and she gradually loses all hope of reaching him. However, her paper planes have their own way to go. Will Blue choose to follow?
Who’s who?
Meet the talent!
The Visitor:
Playwrights: Viktor Buzharov + Natali Spasova
Director: Natali Spasova
Musician: Emilija Ducks
Playing Dominick: Viktor Buzharov
Playing Lisa: Aleksandra Ziółko
Dancer: Mariale Carranza
City Love:
Playwright: František Šimůnek
Director: Mark Prokes
Playing Narin: Sumin Sung
Playing Bonmona: Yael Sophia Webster
Paper Planes:
Playwright: YV Zori
Director: Jazmin
Playing Blue: Mariale Carranza
Playing Mr. Hige: Xavier Mar
Unknown Person: Yael Sophia Webs
Viktor Buzharov
An actor from Macedonia, he graduated acting at the Faculty of Dramatic Arts in Skopje in 2017. Currently he is a second-year master student in Authorial Acting at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. He has performed in the major theaters in Skopje, such as the Macedonian National Theater and the Dramatic Theatre – Skopje. He was part of several TV productions as well, such as “Prespav” and “Yesterday’s news” aired on national televisions.
Jazmín
Artistic director of New Visions, she is excited to finally see the company come to light with its first ever playwriting festival. A dabbling artist, she studies a masters at the department of dramatic theatre at DAMU hoping to learn more about art.
František Šimůnek
Coming from a laureate family, František has always been close to literature. Born in 1992 in Prague, he started writing short forms around the start of the new millennium, and won several junior literary contests, even wrote for an online magazine. František studied chemistry and English, but found a job as a librarian. Aside from creative writing, his passions include photography, singing, and games. He has multitude of experience helping prepare cultural events.
Yael Sophia Webster:
A first year MA student at KATaP. She was born and raised in Nashville, Tennessee, in the United States, and graduated with a BFA in Dramatic Acting from the University of Montevallo. She first encountered DAMU when she visited for the Prague Quadrennial in 2019- it was love at first sight. She is thrilled to have the opportunity to study here, and is amazed every day by all
she discovers through the discipline of Authorial Acting.
Emilija Ducks(they/them)
Born in Macedonia, are a musician and writer, active in both fields simultaneously since their adolescence. Self-taught in poetry, they received a musical education and have had their work published in Macedonia, Serbia and England as well as their music being available on all listening platforms. They’re currently in Manchester, working on their third EP.
Javier Mar
Xavier is a songwriter from Mexico living in Prague since 2019. Doing political analysis by day and art by night, he is now venturing for the first time in the dramatic arts.
Natalija Slavkovska
Is the author of three novels, published in Macedonia, Ukraine, Bulgaria and Serbia. Her short stories have been also published by English, American, Palestinian and Bosnian magazines. Over the years she has been participating in numerous art workshops and residencies, and has won several writing awards and recognitions, some of the most important being “Top 10 female Balkan authors” and “The 10 Macedonian authors of the 21st century”. She publishes under the name Natali Spasova.
YV Zori
Is a Prague based playwright, poet and an actor. Her poems have been featured in “Роден глас” magazine, and her first book was published in April 2022. Her keen interest in theater and acting has led to a collaboration with New Visions Theater Company.
She debuts as a playwright with her play Paper Planes as part of a Playwriting Festival, which is going to take place in May at Divadlo D21, Prague.
Mariale Carranza
A Latina actress that used to study acting at the Pontificia Universidad Católica in Lima, Perú. In addition, she has been part of different musicals, theatre, and short film productions. She has also taken part in diverse acting and contact improvisation workshops. She has danced her entire life. She is a practitioner of Chi-kung, Karate, Tai Chi, and Meditation with several years' experience. Mariale practices acrobatics and Trapeze, and is now a part of the Authorial Acting program at DAMU.
Mark Prokes
Is something vaguely akin to a human and he occasionally does theater. Thank you for coming, enjoy the show.
Sumin Sung
A student from Seoul, South Korea, attending the Prague performing art university (DAMU). She was one of the leaders of the youth political party with the goal of creating a society where young people's opinions are more accepted and also started a social movement against corruption. In addition, she began using theatre as a way to encourage this movement and attempted an experimental play that was performed on the streets. She is working in Prague as a performer finding new possibilities for play.
Aleksandra Ziółko
From Poland, she is a second-year student of Authorial Acting at Academy of Performing Arts in Prague- Master’s program. She finished 3-year Theater Studio in Warsaw and postgraduate studies in Directing of Children and Youth Theater at Academy of Performing Arts in Wroclaw. For seven years she has been performing in performances at the Baza Theater in Warsaw, especially in performances for children.