THE AGENT

Martina Kinská , Radek Schovánek

Cast: 3 men, 1 woman

A powerful intimate story of a family that begins with a task from StB.

Almost a detective drama working with two different time levels: present time and the so called normalisation that started in Czechoslovakia in 1968. The difficult and absurd moments brought by the then regime and living in it are coming to the surface. Hurt proximity and trust, and yet family as the only rock-solid point. Only yesterday we thought we knew each other. Today we probably do not bet our life for our relatives any more. And not at all for ourselves.

The phenomenon of so-called social agents, people who were charged to stalk and inform on their close ones, was during the normalization in Czechoslovakia more common than one might think. Most of the agents were forced to this kind of cooperation by blackmailing or threatening which does not make the consequences of their reporting less serious. However, it might be somehow understandable.

The story of this intimate play takes place in a single day (except for retrospective moments). A son is supposed to leave for studies to the USA the following day and he comes to say goodbye to his parents who are sleeping in their old flat for the last time, moving to their dream house the day after. One period of the family life is closing for good. Everything goes well until the son accuses his father that he was an StB agent and was secretly informing on his wife. Events that both parents wanted to forget about for various reasons start to reveal. It shows that not everything is as black and white as it might have seen and the past is not over yet.

The author and director Martina Kinská won with this play the Mark Ravenhill Award in 2018.

The play is available in the Czech original.