ANEW, 2023 Rehearsal for Truth Theater Festival

New York, June 2-14

Experience engaging contemporary plays by Eastern European playwrights addressing political circumstances and social trends.

Vaclav Havel Library Foundation and Bohemian Benevolent and Literary Association are pleased to present the 2023 Rehearsal for Truth Theater Festival honoring playwright and human rights activist Vaclav Havel. From June 2 to June 14, the Bohemian National Hall will feature award-winning performances from the Czech Republic, Germany, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, and the US.

For the sixth edition, entitled Anew, we have invited theatrical talents who search for stories of the past to make sense of the present and find one’s place in the world. What did it mean to live in and navigate the dark landscape of 1970s Warsaw? To become a political refugee from 1968 Czechoslovakia? To arrive as a member of Jewish family in the 1940s Theresienstadt ghetto? And how does it feel today to be a Russian artist or an orphan teenage Roma girl in Romania?

FULL PROGRAM

All performances are followed by talkbacks. The festival is free to the public. Online registration through Eventbrite is required: rehearsalfortruth.eventbrite.com. Suggested donation $10 is used to support the artists.

ABOUT THE 2023 REHEARSAL FOR TRUTH THEATER FESTIVAL

The 2023 Rehearsal for Truth Theater Festival is organized by the Vaclav Havel Library Foundation and the Bohemian Benevolent and Literary Association in partnership with the Polish Cultural Institute New York, GOH Productions, Trap Door Theatre, Centre of Jewish Culture ŠTETL, Jan Mocek, Martin E. Segal Theatre Center, Palissimo Company, and Romanian Cultural Institute.

The program is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature. The festival is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, Arts and Theatre Institute in Prague, and Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic.