Viktorie Schmoranzová has been the Director of the DISK Theatre, a progressive student venue in Karlova Street in the very heart of Prague, for almost three years. The purpose of this theatre is not to ensure its auditorium is packed – it is meant to allow young theatre artists to try out everything they need to on stage, behind the scenes and in the shops – from bold experiments to established classics. Even so, the venue, which is part of the Theatre Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (DAMU), enjoys almost 70% occupancy of its capacity, which stands for an above-average demand in the Czech environment.
DISK Theatre is a student venue. How does this manifest in practice?
When you are going to DISK, it is a good idea to read the annotation for each show carefully in order to get an idea of what you should expect. The scope of DISK’s offer is quite broad. Our viewers can see everything from classical plays to highly experimental forms of theatre. Also, let’s not forget that the ensemble changes with every passing year. If you saw a show here a year ago, it doesn’t mean you will see the same troupe playing it the next year. Many students who work at DISK are in their final year; they spend one season at DISK, then leave, and younger students take their place.
How is the fact that students make DISK what it is reflected in its dramaturgy?
The theatre follows no singular dramaturgical line because both dramaturgy and directing are up to students who rotate. We stage a total of eight premieres per season; the Department of Dramatic Theatre is responsible for four premieres and the Department of Alternative and Puppet Theatre for the other four. Not everything is done exclusively by students, however. Sometimes, teachers may conclude that students would benefit from working with a professional director on a particular play, and they will invite a pro collaborator.
You say DISK experiments a lot. What does that mean specifically?
Students get to familiarise with various theatrical forms, ranging from multimedia to collective theatre to object theatre, musical and political theatre, and interpretation theatre.
Who chooses what will be on at DISK? What are the criteria?
Both Departments know, well in advance, that they will stage four premieres each, and the leading teachers of each year agree with students on what they will stage.
Theory and Criticism students organise DISK_USE debates with viewers during which they can meet the entire creative teams. Is the general public interested in these debates?
Yes, they are. The authors prepare the discussion and moderate it, and viewers stay after the show and discuss it with the creative team. This has added educational value. Students need to absorb the show, see it a few times, and prepare their questions. In turn, the creative team learns to discuss their work with viewers who were not present when the show was being made. The Department of Drama in Education often organises accompanying seminars and workshops along with DISK shows, whether for primary or secondary school students.
What is the overall demand for your shows? Are you sold out?
We are. Some performances are sold out long in advance. Generally, occupancy rates in DISK are almost 70 per cent, which is quite good. This is because many people want to see all four premieres prepared by that year’s students. Many viewers come to see isolated plays, and quite a lot of them are simply interested in the work of the up-and-coming generation of theatre artists. I also think that we have high visitor rates thanks to very favourable admission prices, which are lower than most.
What types of shows are most in-demand?
I don’t want to pinpoint individual plays. Even though we collect admission fee at DISK, it is not our priority to be sold out at all costs. We are here for the students who learn by playing and repeating shows. This means that we do not intentionally schedule plays that attract the biggest audiences. All projects have between 14 and 18 reprises. We do our best to send students to festivals and guest appearances, but we don’t prioritise a specific project just because it is more in-demand. We are a learning workstation and students gain experience here by reprising their performances.
What is the essence of your role as the Director of DISK?
In addition to standard managerial tasks such as budgeting, financial checks, team leadership and development, my colleagues and I assist with developing DISK projects. Shows are built all the way from the initial budget to final production. In practice, this means that our workshops will produce the stage set as designed by students. This makes DISK unique – we have our workshops whereas most theatres outsource the manufacturing of their sets. The reason is to allow students to take part in designing the set and see how a show takes shape, rather than have them send their drawings by e-mail and wait until the manufactured product arrives. By the same token, we have a costume shop that makes and prepares costumes, again based on students’ designs. We as the theatre also cover the promotion of the projects and make sure the shows have their light, sound and stage crews… Those are DISK employees, not students. They are in charge of standard repertoire plays.
You have been in your position since 2022. What has been the toughest task for you so far?
The human factor can be the hardest nut to crack. I am speaking of situations when the expectations, ideas and needs of the students do not match the capabilities of our theatre. Those are the most difficult moments. I am the only teacher on DISK staff; the other employees are experts in their fields and jobs but are not teachers. Then there are student artist teams from the majority of Departments. They are at the end of their studies and want to present themselves, to show how good they are, and they are often firmly convinced that theirs is the only way things can be. And then there is the third group of stakeholders, and that’s DAMU teachers. Sometimes, the three groups do not quite meet in their expectations and needs, and these moments can be the most daunting.
Can you give us a specific example?
Students want to get everything at once and are under the impression that everything is possible in our theatre. Sometimes, though, they want something that is plainly not feasible in a theatre venue, whether technologically or in terms of personnel. At the same time, many teachers are active in theatres and have their own ideas of how the theatre process and operation should work. DISK is a theatre venue that tries to imitate ‘standard’ operation of a repertoire theatre as much as it can, yet it is also a student theatre with its inherent opportunities and limitations.
This year, DAMU opens a new programme, Light and Audiovisual Design for Live Art. What do you think of it? Will you use the services of its master level graduates?
We are immensely happy for this programme because theatre technologies are immensely important for staging theatre shows. Theatre formats change rapidly, and light design, sound design and new media constitute an important part of the final form of modern theatre. DISK is equipped very well in terms of light and sound technology. This is one of the reasons why professionals – and not students – must man the consoles. Time will tell – and so will the alumni and alumnae of the new programme – what the collaboration will look like in practice. What is certain is that part of the instruction will take place on our premises, and I hope that students will be involved in the creation of graduation shows. We have yet to see how they will fare in practice. For example, there is a scenography student who was interested in light design so much and worked the console at DISK so often that she eventually ‘earned her stripes’ hands-on and is now our lighting technician. This sort of collaboration is obviously very nice as it represents another useful link between students, a fresh graduate, and seasoned pros who work the consoles.
What is your funding?
Almost 100% of it comes from AMU, and we occasionally obtain a grant. For example, we were recently able to go to a festival in Bulgaria thanks to the National Recovery Plan. We have a separate budget and we also run auxiliary activities – a café that DISK leases out. The funding for our equipment and for the refurbishment of our premises and technologies comes from various Ministry of Education programmes. Not having to focus on fundraising is a huge relief. Still, students might be surprised to learn that we collect more than a million crowns annually in admission fees, and that certainly makes a difference.
You are a teacher – you teach arts management. What are the current theatre students like?
I can only speak for the students of the Department of Arts Management really. It seems to me that not much has changed in the 20 years since I was a student at DAMU. Students are nice and hard-working people, and fun to be with. One difference could be that they are more aware of their personal life – they know how to set up the boundaries of their working time. The atmosphere has also evolved in the sense that we are much more open to each other – I to them and they to me as their teacher. Working with students is without a doubt one of my primary motivations for helming DISK and the thing that I enjoy the most about my work.
What would you like to improve at DISK in the years to come?
We recently completed the refurbishment of the upper segment, the rigging above the stage. One year from now, we will do stage two of the refurbishment of this equipment and also of the pit, or the lower segment. We will also refurbish the workshops to enable more students to take part in making stage sets. Generally, we could say our theatre is trying to keep pace with current technologies and get the most from the limited space of the venue and backstage through structural modifications. We constantly keep enhancing our lighting equipment; our sound equipment is very good so we can produce concerts on a pro level; and we keep equipping our workshops. We follow the evolution trends in the theatre world as much as our funding allows. We are also planning to improve the equipment of actors’ dressing rooms by adding visual monitors to sound monitors so that actors can see – and not just hear – the action on stage. We also want to improve our staff meetings to match our status as a teaching workplace. Even though DISK is a teaching workplace, its employees are not educational personnel, which is why we constantly strive for improvement in educational terms. We have been working with a mentor from Učitel naživo (Home Teach Live), an organisation that helps us with topics such as feedback, motivation, setting boundaries, and so on. We have also begun using the services of an external facilitator during DISK project evaluation meetings. We still have a lot of room for improvement.