15 December 1931, Elbančice – 14 December 1988, Prague
Prominent Czech film, TV and theatre director and scriptwriter of international repute. One of the most significant figures of the New Wave. Because of his innovative approach to film and theatre he was labelled “philosopher of the Czech New Wave”.
After studying directing at the Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague (FAMU) in 1962 Evald Schorm worked at first in the Studio of Documentary Film, where his long collaboration with the cameraman Jan Špáta began. Their best documentaries include the short films Earth to Earth (Země zemi, 1962) and To Live Your Life (Žít svůj život, 1963) about the photographer Josef Sudek, and Reflection (Zrcadlení, 1965). Schorm gradually moved from documentaries and short films towards feature films. He created most of these between 1965 and 1969, but most of his films were censored and were banned until as late as 1990. The psychological films Courage for Every Day (Každý den odvahu, 1964), Return of the Prodigal Son (Návrat ztraceného syna, 1966) and the adaptation of Josef Škvorecký‘s novel The End of a Priest (Farářův konec, 1968) brought him international repute. After the parable The Seventh Day, the Eighth Night (Den sedmý, osmá noc, 1969), inspired by the Soviet invasion in the August of 1968, he was banned from making any films, which made him focus on theatre directing. He worked in Prague’s Theatre on the Balustrade, The Drama Club, Semafor and Studio Ypsilon, but also in opera and in a number of theatres outside Prague. In 1974 he became director in the theatre Laterna magika, in which he masterfully combined theatrical and film devices. From 1982 he also collaborated with the drama ensemble of the National Theatre. One of his best stage productions was the adaptation of The Brothers Karamazov in Theatre on the Balustrade (TV recording was made in 1981).
Evald Schorm’s films are characterised by a unique capturing of individuals’ mental states and of social changes. It is heavily existentialist and clearly influenced by Franz Kafka’s works. As a theatre director, Schorm applied to actors a film approach to body movements and the visual appearance of the stage, educating thus an exceptional generation of actors. The Prague theatre Evald was named after Schorm. In 1992 he was posthumously awarded the Order of Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk for his lifetime contribution to film and theatre.
Era connected with the beginnings of Czech cinematography, the first three decades of original Czech film production. At the time, film was limited to mere visual recording, without spoken language. Bohemia was the sixth country in the world in which original silent films were made.
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