Idea
Jacques Lecoq always gave priority to play; joy from games. Supported and developed the human desire to discover new and surprising and filled everything with fantasy mystery and poetry. Believed in the abilities of people to observe and imitate nature and things around us and reconfigure them into a dramatic form. He was, in my opinion, a new age “Komensky”, he gave priority to a school through games. No tables and chairs, in empty space students from various world directions, improvise, search for the given topic the most exact human gesture, feeling, dramatic twist. At the same time they rest against natural laws and the natural rhythm of life.
Once I completed studies at the International Jacques Lecoq school in Paris, I spent ten years teaching, not only in France, but also during a world tour with Philippe Genty, in Cambodia, South Africa, New Zealand, South Korea etc. I was giving my years of acting experience in artistic workshops; I also had a chance to discover many different theatre styles and methods.
These trips around the world enriched me greatly by new experiences in communication and teaching in different cultures, they also helped to convince me completely of the uniqueness of this method and I could see that the Jacques Lecoq method knows no borders, is an internationally understandable teaching method, which can be naturally assumed by practically anyone. During these years I began to seriously think about founding my own school based on movement theatre and using the Lecoq method.
Upon my return to Prague I taught this method in several one–off workshops and a full year at the nonverbal faculty at HAMU. Several students of mine and HAMU students expressed interest in continuing to discover this method further. They wanted the opportunity to educate themselves complexly in their individual theatre disciplines, which incorporate movement work, improvisation, collective work and in other disciplines such as acrobatics and modern dance. I became convinced to open a private movement theatre school, which would be a benefit for Czech and world theatre. This is how the idea of the “Budil theatre school“.
I hope that I will be able through opening the Budil theatre school in Prague I will be able to help Czech and other eastern European students by bringing the Jacques Lecoq method a little closer as studying in Paris can be quite expensive. Mr. Jacques Lecoq once told me of his sadness that so few Slavonic students went through his school. He liked Slavs a great deal. I think that if he was still alive today, he would be happy to see that his teachings are getting into eastern countries and he would respect, and support my attempt, the same way that his wife Fay Lees Lecoq (see) did for us, she leads the Lecoq school in Paris now and we have agreed to cooperate in expanding the method in Eastern Europe.
I believe that we will fulfil the expectations of our students.
With respect Vendula Burger
Founder, director and instructor of the Budil theatre school
