Pundit: Coalition “will clash more often” now Babiš has immunity, Prague museum acquires Milena Jesenská's suitcase, Prague Talk with Vít Hořejš and Bonnie Stein

0:00This is Radio Prague International coming to you from the Czech capital. Hello and welcome to Radio Prague International. I'm Sierra Krieger Wolf and in today's program we have an interview with political scientist Yeji Pehe on the Parliament members vote not to turn over Andrei Babish and Tomio Okomuro for criminal prosecution. Next up we'll have a story about a newly acquired suitcase from the late Czech writer, journalist and translator, Milena Jysinska. And later, Vite Horses and Bonnie Stein, who run the Czechoslovak American Marionette theater, discuss their new feature film. All that and more, but first Romana Gratiova with the news. News President Petr Pavel and King Abdullah II agreed in a phone call on the need to hold Iran's attacks in the Middle East and find a constructive solution for peace.

1:04The Czech president also reassured the Jordanian monarch of Czech support and thanked him for helping evacuate Czechs from the country, according to the statements today on the social network X. About 4,900 Czechs are currently registered in the Drost travel system, in countries affected by the conflict between the United States, Israel and Iran around 500 fewer than on Thursday. This follows information provided today by the Czech foreign ministry. The average wage in Czech Republic rose by 7.2% last year to 49,250 Czech crowns. On average, people received 3,316 Czech crowns more on their pay slips. For the second year in a row, the average wage also increased in real terms. After adjusting for inflation, it grew by 4.6%. According to analysts, real wages have thus approached the 2019 level before the pandemic

2:08and the subsequent wave of inflation. This year, they are expected to surpass that level. Health authorities in the South Moravian region expect the number of hepatitis cases to rise in spring. They say people will spend more time outdoors and may eat outside more often. Renata Tsupik, head of the anti-pandemic department, told journalists today that the outbreak did not slow down during winter even when people were wearing gloves. More frequent disinfection of public spaces and public transport vehicles also failed to reduce the spread. Tsupik partly attributes this to people not following basic hygiene habits and urges thorough hand washing and preventive vaccination. The Ministry of Finance of the Czech Republic will begin monitoring profit margins at petrol stations to prevent excessive increases as global oil prices rise following the conflict involving Iran.

3:09Finance Minister Alina Shilatovaz said higher fuel purchase prices must not be used as an excuse to artificially raise margins. If margins increase disproportionately, the government may introduce measures including setting a fixed margin. And now with the weather, Saturday will bring clear skies across most of the country. Daytime highs will range between 13 and 16 degrees Celsius, dropping to around 10 degrees Celsius in the mountains. That was the news and we turn now to current affairs. Czech Parliamentary members voted on Thursday not to turn over the heads of two parties in the governing coalition, Andrei Babish and Tomia Okamura for the criminal prosecution in two separate cases. But now that he is immunity, will Prime Minister Babish of Anno change his approach to the two smaller partners? Mr. Okamura's freedom and direct democracy and the motorists. Ian Willoughby discussed the situation with political scientist Yiji Pehe.

4:10The Czech government coalition is quite unique in that it consists of three parties. And two leaders of those parties are currently under or where under criminal investigation. Then now they have immunity. I don't think there is any comparable example in the rest of Europe at this point. But of course the fact that they need to teach other to gain immunity somehow in a very almost perverse way, sentence their cooperation. Thursday's vote was largely a formality, it was only going to go one way. But is there a chance now that Andrei Babish has cleared this hurdle that he may somehow change his approach to the other parties, particularly the motorists who have made a lot of headlines since coming to power? Well, Andrei Babish, until gaining immunity, actually had been quite vulnerable because he

5:14could be extorted by his coalition partners, he depended on them for delivering votes that would make him gain immunity. So his performance in the last two or three months was really awkward if he compared his performance as the head of the Czech government from 2018 to 2021 when he was very decisive and he called the shots so to speak. In the last three months he has been quite often on defense, he was not able to make decisions the way he is used to. So I think that now some after his gain immunity, some of that may change. But of course, he is still dependent on the motorists and freedom and direct democracy party for the votes in the parliament, without them, he doesn't have a majority. But at the same time, of course, given the fact that his movement is by far the strongest

6:19in the government coalition, he may be more decisive and he may call the shots so to speak in the government much more than he has done until now. Well, it's still early days or early-ish days, but do you feel that this three party coalition are likely to stay the course and to remain in power for the whole of their terms, so to speak? I think this is a very unstable coalition because although all three parties are basically populist parties, two of them are very different from Babish's honor movement. Honor is sort of purely populist, but to some extent, centrist party, whereas Mr. Okamura's freedom and direct democracy party and the motorists are not really, maybe extremists, but extreme right parties and they have priorities which Mr. Clash with Mr. Babish's priorities wants to be recognized on the European scene.

7:21He wants to be respected and he does not want to get engaged in any accesses in foreign policy, whereas these two parties have ideas, especially Mr. Okamura and his party, have policies which are in some ways in contradicting Mr. Babish's priorities. So we will see what will happen. I think that they will crash more often now and this coalition may not in the end survive. Political scientist Yiji Pehe talking there to my colleague Ian Wilby. Prague Museum of Czech Literature has acquired a suitcase that once belonged to writer, journalist and translator Milena Giesenska, a close friend and translator of Franz Kafka. The item was preserved by the family of a fellow prisoner who shared a cell with her. Ruth Frankowa has a story. Milena Giesenska is often remembered for her relationship with Franz Kafka, but she was also one

8:24of the leading figures of Czechoslovakia's interwar journalism. During the Second World War, she joined the anti Nazi resistance arrested by the Gestapo. She was deported to the Ravensbrick concentration camp where she died in 1944. Prague's Museum of Czech Literature has now received a suitcase that once belonged to Yessenska. The object was preserved for decades by the family of Bojenaparikowa, a fellow resistance member who shared a prison cell with her. Last January, Barikowa's son Arno decided to donate it to the museum's literary archive. Betterkotik from the archive explains how the suitcase came into the family's possession. At the turn of 1939-1940, Bojenaparikowa was imprisoned in Pankrat's prison. As a resistance member who collected money for families, his breadwinners had been arrested by the Nazis. In prison, she shared a cell with Milena Giesenska. She had been arrested because she

9:30helped people escape across the border, both endangered anti-fascists and people of Jewish origin who were at risk. Their meeting would later determine the fate of the suitcase, he says. When Milena Giesenska was being transported to a trial in Dresden and didn't have enough space for the thing she had accumulated in prison, Bojenaparikowa gave her her own large suitcase. She kept Milena Giesenska's smaller suitcase instead. The small leather suitcase now somewhat worn with age and bearing two old hotel labels likely dates back to the period when Giesenska lived in Vienna with her husband Ernest Borlach. Around the same time in 1919 and 1920, she was corresponding with Franz Kafka, so it is possible she already had the suitcase when the two met.

10:32When Bojenaparikowa was released from prison in 1940, she took the suitcase home with her to nearby Sparlenar Street in Prague, where it remained for more than eight years. When the object was eventually offered to the museum, archivists began looking into its history. When we investigated the story, we discovered in the national archive that everything matched. The two women had indeed been imprisoned in park rats at the same time. This indirectly confirmed the story that had been passed down orally in the Pashik family. According to recollections preserved by the Badiq family, Giesenska made a strong impression on the younger prisoners. She was already a well-known journalist of the first Czechoslovak Republic, writing for the influential journal Przitom Nast, edited by Fredinand Porotka.

11:35She spoke out against social injustice and supported women's rights. For Bojenaparikowa, the meeting remained unforgettable. One dramatic episode from that time survives only in the memories of the Badiq family, says Mr Kotik. According to Badiqowa's son, Giesenska once broke her glasses in the cell, swallowed the shards and attempted suicide. A Czech guard later brought her a sorrow crack, which wrapped around the glass fragments and allowed them to pass through her body. She survived only a few more years before dying in a Nazi concentration camp. Because Giesenska was arrested during the war, many of her personal belongings were confiscated or destroyed by the Nazis. As a result, relatively few items connected with her life have survived.

12:35Even so, archivists still hope that new materials may one day appear. No, no, no. Giesenska had relationships with several men, and one of them was Yulia Spuchik, whom she even hid from the Czechoslovak police, where communists were illegal during the first republic. We still hope that somewhere in archival materials there may be leisureists from Milan and Giesenska to Fuchik. That's something we'd very much like to find. The museum of Czech literature plans to display the suitcase in a future exhibition devoted to Prague's German language literary scene, to Franz Kafka and Milan and Giesenska, or in a show presenting new additions to its collections. That report from Ruth Nanková. You're listening to Radio Prague International, and it is now time for today's main feature. Vite Hojez and Bonnie Stein are an American Czech couple who for many years have been running

13:37a puppet theater in New York. Now the pair can be seen on screen in a new feature film, which they discuss with Ian Wilby now in this edition of Prague Talk. This week saw the first screening in Prague of the independent movie Wooden Hearts, starring Pete Hojez, founder of the Czechoslovak American Marjana Theatre. The fiction film also features many of the traditional puppets that Hojez, who left Czechoslovakia in the late 1970s, and covered in an old Czech church in Manhattan several decades ago. He and his life partner, Bonnie Stein, who produced Wooden Hearts and also appears in the charming picture, stopped by at our studios just ahead of the screening. Pete, I'd like to start with the Czechoslovak American Marjana Theatre.

14:38I know it began in New York in the early 1990s, and I understand the whole story began when some old Marjanaettes were found at the Janhus church in Manhattan. Indeed, I actually had three Marjanaettes. I was involved in a production, very avant-garde production. Two avant-garde, for my taste, of Gertus Faust Part II, and I told the director about the tradition of Marjanaette Faust as the biggest hit of the old Itinerant puppeteering families. She said, OK, take a scene, rewrite it, direct it with puppets, and my mother bought me a devil in Prague from a collector. She posted the devil to New York? She posted the devil got an exit stamp on his hoof and on his soul and made it to New York, and then I got a witch after that,

15:40just because the family continued supplying me with puppets and apprentices. I was doing storytelling besides theatre, so I involved those puppets in the storytelling, and then I did it once at Janhus church in New York, 74th Street, in what used to be the Czech neighborhood on the Upper East Side, and they told me we used to have a puppet theatre here, and I kept asking what happened to the puppets. The theatre has not been active for quite a while, until they let me go to the attic, and there I found in an old just two dozen ancient Marjanaettes, which turned out to be 100 to 200-year-old. What condition were they in? It's amazing how Lyndon would last, but they didn't have any strings and it controls some of the costumes were falling apart. And were they Czech made originally?

16:43They were Czech made eventually, so this is way before I started. The company, this is maybe 84 or some such year, but I kept thinking about it, and when I quit the fantastic oblite theatre, it was kind of obvious with another friend who studied puppetry in Prague, that we started this company. We did Faust, of course, as the first production right there at Janhus church in front of the altar. Our devils were flying back and forth, and that was the beginning of the theatre with the ancient theatre puppets, so we had to attach strings, make controls. I learned how to make controls. Is it the case that a good part of your repertoire is all Czech fairy tales? That was the start, and the first show was this very traditional marionette version of Faust,

17:46but then I was very much admired drug theatre from Eastern Bohemia from, and they really convinced me that puppetry marionette theatre had some future because they were mixing puppets with live performers, and that was really interesting. So our first Faust was almost traditional with puppeteers who you couldn't see that were hidden behind the curtain, but eventually the devil tore down the curtain and the puppeteers were seen, but after that we did shows that were developed by, mostly by me, but that were contemporary or almost contemporary themes and mixed life performers with the marionettes. Well now you and Bunny are here in Prague, you're about to present your film Wooden Hearts, which centers on you, the puppeteer, and the marionettes.

18:50How did this project come about, it's Bunny. So during the pandemic in New York, we were actually living outside the city for a while and kind of stuck there, but Veet was asked to, he was cast in a film by owner Tukal, who is our director of our film, in a sort of a controlled environment in a church, and he was the puppeteer with the devil, and I don't remember the entire scene, but it's called Scenes of In An Empty Church, and then owner was fascinated by the puppets, and we started to talk a little bit more about various projects and things, so eventually we said let's try to do something together, and this film was the object of it. I mean at first, Veet was invited to Nebraska, where there's a big Czech community to do a performance, and the local presenter was very excited about Veet coming, but we told him, I also helped

19:50make all the tours and produce, and we told him that one show driving all the way to the midwest from New York City is not really enough, and he managed to get nine locations, so then the question was who's going to go with Veet, whether we have an extra puppeteer, which sometimes or a musician, and then we spoke to owner about making a film, and Veet had a different idea for a different film, and owner had a different idea, we finally came up with a road trip film. And owner plays one of the main characters in the film, you also act in the film, how did you both find the experience of making it? Well I had a different experience because I didn't go on the three, was it three weeks almost of touring around the midwest, but it was, I mean he's a very creative guy, there was some basic script, but there was also some improvisation, I thought it was fascinating, and actually a lot of fun. Since it was not the film, I wanted to make about

20:51a 19th century puppeteer, Czech American puppeteer who traveled around the midwest, and he had everything for the film, for a movie, he was a bigamist, he made fake money, counterfeiter, and went to prison for that and escaped for a while from the prison. Anyway, that was not happening, so I was just going with the flow, except I kept telling owner and the crew, whenever I said that, now Veet does this, Veet does that, I said this is not about Veet, give that character a name already, because yet again we did use as a background me telling puppets, stories with the puppets, but it's a fiction, it's the whole film is fiction like that's important to know. Let's ask you how much is the character close to you or based on you? The background, the storytelling with Mary and

21:55they are shots from actual performances that I did, but everything that's built on top of it, yes there is traveling and long drives and the things like that like I did, but the whole story, the personal story, and there's also one of the most important things besides a lot of womanizing that of course cannot be about me, is about my son that I supposedly turned from a puppet, giving him a life among people and he's unhappy about that, so it's a reverse binocchio story, so that's for me but also the most interesting thing about the film. When you tour to these places like Nebraska, who are the audience members usually? Way back I did a tour, I just kind of stumbled into a school tour, so that was mostly schools and some Indian reservations and

23:03reservation schools and things like that, this time there were some schools as well and unusually so it was mostly Czech communities because it all started through the Czech embassy, through the culture, the Czech embassy, who had that interest from a beer fest in Nebraska that wanted the entertainment and they ended up having a puppet show, that was the first beer fest I ever performed for, and that these Czech communities were really, really so much into it that that was great. During my school tour that was three and a half months all over from Idaho to New Mexico, I had two Czech communities in 151 shows and this was all, was it nine stops I believe, in seven Czech communities and they really loved it they all kind of have an inkling that there is

24:09such a tradition and they were so, so happy to encounter it live. There's one scene in the film where the puppeteers van is stolen, spoiler and all the marionettes are in it given how the marionettes are presumably completely irreplaceable, valuable. When you travel do you have to take any particular precautions? I used to be very very cautious about whenever I was in a motel, it was up the stairs two flights and I would drag a heavy trunk all the way up to my room for the night. Eventually I really became less cautious about it and once in New York where I shouldn't be leaving anything in a van overnight I did it and the van was broken into and I was flabbergasted. The trunk was open,

25:17the puppets were strewn around the back of the van and none of them was gone. They all stayed there because the guy or I suppose it was a guy who broke and whoever broke and had no idea first of all how valuable they were and probably would not be able to get the value for them. Actually in the film you have that happening that the hitchhiker who eventually becomes my helper he pushes through to be my helper played by the director of the film who steals the van with the puppets is trying to sell them and of course when he says they're two thousand dollars each or more than that he's offered $50 or something like that. We do have an extensive insurance policy but the truth is you're not really they're not replaceable unless they're recreated. We have though I think that

26:19you might remember in one of the things we did kind of early on is make some copies. We had the made here in Prague the devil that we'd had which is about a hunt I guess 120 or so so we have now six I think six devils of various sizes and some of the other really valuables once we've had copies made. They never are exactly good enough though it's something about those old ones that really the expression the way the carvers did you know it's just phenomenal but there are good people here that have helped to make copies not in the US we've never found a really good carver there that can do that. They're very resilient and they lived that many years yet we didn't feel like knocking them about so much that's why we made the copies we also had the copies made larger than those puppets traditionally actually in history those puppeteering families would have

27:23bigger and bigger puppets to compete with each other yet still we made bigger copies. As you say you've been doing this now for several decades I presume a day will eventually come let's hope it's a long time into the future when you hang up your marionettes or when you call it a day do you have any plan for what to do with them? Oh the work and out of legacy plan but it's not easy yeah when we in fact beat his head apprenticeship program going that was supported by the New York State Council on the Arts so there are some people who are trained but whether any of them will take the marionettes and be able to do exactly the same kind of thing that's another story. There's really no one I have a company some people have been with me for almost 30 years now but they also getting older and those puppets at the annus church slept there for over 50 years

28:27so I don't know if they're going to go to sleep again for half a century. We hope not. Beat Horses and Bonnie Stein speaking with Ian will be about their new film and that's all we have for you today thank you all for tuning in and remember you'll find these stories and more at radio.cz should you like to contact us our email address is english at radio.cz and you can always follow radio prog on instagram, facebook and x. We're happy to hear from you and as always I'm Sierra Krieger Wolf and have a beautiful rest of your day.