Heading Back to Prague

I'm currently in Melbourne and just finished narrating 8 Arthur Upfield books for Bolinda Audio.

Upfield was born in the UK but spent most of his life in the outback of Australia and wrote a series of detective stories in the years from the 1930s to the 1960s. The central character was a half caste Aboriginal named Napolean Bonaparte (Boney to his friends). Although the books are extremely dated in their attitudes to the Aboriginal, they are some of Bolinda's best sellers both locally and internationally. Very good sellers among the truck stops of outback Australia. Apparently I'm very big with the truck drivers.

After 5 weeks in Melbourne narrating these books (making more than 50 titles I have narrated for this company), I return to Prague tomorrow. The work situation there is not good for English speaking actors, and in fact is not all that rosy for Czech speaking actors. Plenty of work for them, but not much money. The pay rates are nowhere near the rates we enjoy in Australia, and the cost of living is getting to be pretty similar.

English speaking actors in Prague don't have the luxury of relying on the state to get them through periods of unemployment, so almost all have day jobs. Which means rehearsals mostly have to be in the evening after everyone has put in a day of teaching or whatever. Not an ideal scenario for spontaneity and creativeness. Nevertheless, there is a thriving English language theatre scene which is growing healthier as we move into the new decade.