Czech actor Jan Hrušínský insists that famous faces have never had to complain about salaries in his theater. He revealed who he hired in an interview for . A member of the Hrušínský acting dynasty has art in his blood. His father was Rudolf Hrušínský the elder, and he has Rudolf Hrušínský the younger as his brother.
Jan is also famous – he played in the movie The Girl on the Broom, in the fairy tale How the Princess Wakes, or in the movie My Brother has a Great Brother. He is also the principal of the Na Jezerce Theater in Prague, thus continuing an old family tradition. The traveling theater company was already owned by his great-great-grandparents in 1883. Thus, Hrušínský also has his own view on the financing of theaters.
“I’m not saying it’s easy, but I haven’t applied for subsidies for several years. We manage without them. In the Czech Republic, a line is drawn, and it is still a remnant of socialism, that only contributory organizations are subsidized. A situation has arisen here that theaters do not die naturally. That is, when they are unsuccessful. They get another portion of money and go again. They wrote to us that we are successful, so we should help ourselves. When I asked if they only support failed theaters, no one answered me,” he surprised in an interview for a Slovak weekly.
They performed in his theater Jiřina Bohdalová, Jan Tříska or Milan Kňažko. How did he get them?
“We agreed and we are glad that they played here. Jiřina Bohdalová last performed with us alongside Milan Kňažek in the play Gin Game. Jan Tříska was also in our theater for a long time. We paid for his plane tickets from Los Angeles and his hotel. We have 230 seats and have never had a penny of debt. So it is not true that theaters cannot be self-sufficient. Interesting that those who have a thousand seats and sell tickets for a thousand kroner a day claim this. They have a million crowns every night and yet they complain and ask for high subsidies,” he said openly.
