On Saturday, 26 May about 30 protesters from an extreme right movement disrupted the performance of the play “Our violence and your violence” by Croatian stage director Oliver Frljic at the theatre festival “Divadelni Svet” in Brno. Protesters climbed onto the stage and formed a human shield to prevent the audience from watching the play while some booed and threw pieces of paper at the actors from the Mladinsko Theatre Ljubljana. The protesters were eventually thrown out of the theatre by riot police.
Czech Cardinal Dominik Duka has condemned the festival in a letter on behalf of other bishops, from featuring the play. The theatre festival has resisted demands the play be withdrawn from the programme. Based on “The Aesthetics of Resistance” by Peter Weis, “Our Violence and your Violence” is Frljic’s comment on Fascism and Islamophobia.

Update: On 29 of May the Mladinsko Theatre has sent a letter of protest to the Embassy of the Czech Republic in Ljubljana. The theatre declares “that the Brno police, the instrument of Czech authorities, did not come to prevent the violence and protect freedom of speech and artistic expression, but were rather waiting for the violence to happen before they reacted.”

Sources: N1, MDR Kultur, Radio Prague, Mladinsko Theatre