What's behind all the humor we love to experience from the position of a spectator? What's behind all the elegance and lightness of dancers that we so often admire? And how about stand-up comedians? Are they all really so funny and happy? And dancers, what happens with their energy when the spotlight switches off? A rollercoaster ride. Euphoria giving in to fear and trembling knees... And still, we can't help wanting it over and over.

Recently, Václav Kuneš has been enchanted by the genre of stand-up comedy. He has spent hours and hours watching the masters of the genre, among them Jimmy Fallon, Dave Chappelle, Omid Djalili, Mitch Fatel or the Hollywood actor Robin Williams. It is on the ground plan of stand-up comedy that he now builds his new piece, one to oscillate between humour and poignant questions that go underneath the skin of those who stand on stage and try to make the audience laugh. Is performance on stage more a form of psychotherapy or rather copy-pasting our own ideas again and again and betraying our emotions?

We are not only misleading ourselves but we are also trying hard to deceive people around us. One of the frequent aspects of stand-up comedy is the use of the performer's own 'tragic stories' and mishaps wrapped in and spiced-up with (often black) humour. The audience can usually identify with individual stories and therefore they can laugh at them at the very moment. In many ways, in everyday life, we use the same tools to get by, to be able to laugh about ourselves, about our own mistakes to simply reconfirm to ourselves that we ARE living. And it is very inspiring at certain moments. This effort to camouflage things generates adrenalin one can become addicted to. How far are we willing to go to satisfy the need for this adrenalin? Where are the limits for us to purposely 'create' these mistakes and mishaps only to validate our living? And why do we even do that?

Music for the piece is composed by Owen Belton, a Canadian composer and a holder of the prestigious Dora Mavor Award, known to the Czech public for his collaboration with Crystal Pite, a renowned Canadian choreographer. Pite was introduced to the Czech audience by the intermediary of 420PEOPLE who invited her to perform at the New Stage of the National Theatre within the TANEC PRAHA festival in 2011. Costumes are be designed by a young Prague-based fashion designer tandem Anna Tušková and Radka Sirková who create under the label CHATTY. Among other things, the young designers have received the Designblok Award in 2011.

choreographer, dancer, artistic director of 420PEOPLE Dance company

In 1993 he graduated from the Dance conservatory in Prague, Czech Republic.

For  11 years, he was a member of the Nederlands Dans Theater where he  worked with Jiří Kylián, Ohad Naharin, William Forsythe, Paul Lightfoot,  Mats Ek, Nacho Duato, Johan Inger, Andre Gingras or Hans van Manen to  name a few. In 2004 he became a freelance artist, danced many years with  Saburo Teshigawara and for one of his works, Scream and Whispers he was  nominated for Dancer of the Year 2005 award in Cannes. He was guesting  at various gala events with Roberto Bolle, Sylvie Guillem and others. 

He  worked as an assistant to J. Kylián with many companies around the  world.
As a choreographer he worked for theatres in France, Holland,  Denmark, Sweden, Germany, USA, Czech Republic and Japan. 
In 2015 he  was invited to perform in the creation of Solaris by Saburo Teshigawara,  contemporary opera produced by Théâtre des Champs Elysées in Paris.

Since  2007 he is the artistic director at 420PEOPLE, group he co-founded with  Nataša Novotná. Artistic mission was always focused on creativity and  collaborations.

420PEOPLE invited many choreographers and dancers  from around the world: Crystal Pite, Ohad Naharin, Saburo Teshigawara,  Jiří Kylián, Talia Paz, Michael Schumacher, Jo Strömgren, Ann Van der  Broek. In 2017 they collaborated with Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and his  Eastman group on a new work called Nomad.

420PEOPLE also  coproduced two dance films with Jo Strømgren Kompani: Closed which was  premiered at the Berlinale Festival in 2017 and The Accident in 2021. 

In  recent years he has created several works in Japan in collaboration  with Yamamoto Ballet Company and with OPTO File group of ex-dancers from  Nederlands Dans Theater, currently based in Japan. In 2016 it was La  Mantovana, then REEN was performed at the New National Theater in Tokyo.  In 2017 he created a piece Echo with full orchestra playing Dvořák’s  Symphony from The New World as an opening of a new theater in Ota. That  same year he created work Recall which was then touring Japan in 2018. 

In  2018, 420PEOPLE has moved into their new home-venue in Prague, the La  Fabrika Theater. Vaclav’s first work there, The Watcher, with live music  by award winning rock band Please the Trees, is still on the repertory  there until today and it has been performed at the GONG hall during the  Colours of Ostrava music festival for an audience of 1500 people. La  Fabrika then coproduced a “pièce d’occasion”, dance cabaret evening also  with live music, dancers, actors, singers and a puppet called One and  Done. 

In 2018 and 2021 Vaclav was a jury member of the Czech  national TV series StarDance, one of the most watched TV programs in the  country.

In March 2019 he created choreography for a new Czech  musical ‘Mandrake flower’ and later that year he was the Associate  choreographer to Cherkaoui on the creation of the opera Alceste at the  Bayerische Staatsoper in München. In 2020 Vaclav created two dance  films: ORĪGĪ (as a part of the EU project CLASH!) and The Flammable  Machines - the Audition with renowned Czech film director Jaroslav  Brabec. 

Most current works are: stage play Beauty and the Beast  (dir. Daniela Špinar) with the drama dept. of the National Theater in  Prague with dancers and acrobats and two full evening dance works:  EVOLUTION for Bühnen Halle Ballett and EVER with 420PEOPLE. All on  display in the 2023-2024 season. 

In 2022 Vaclav started new  concept called 42+people focused on creating dance works for dancers  above the age of 42 years. The first work, duet WHERE, created and  performed together with Helena Arenbergerova was highly successful and  earned them both the Thalia Award nominations for best performance,  Helena then receiving it in 2023.

420PEOPLE performed in venues  in France, Spain, Sweden, Poland, Germany, South Korea, Russia,  Slovakia, Serbia, Cyprus, Mexico, Italy, Finland, Holland, Norway, Japan  and U.K. 

Source and more information: https://www.vaclavkunes.org/