Please Enter Destination

Play For Voices

Please Enter Destination by Tereza Semotamová

Translated from the Czech by Barbora Růžičková

A young couple, Helena and Honza, on a weekend drive to visit bourgeois friends, find that their new GPS has a life of its own and their friendly hitchhiker is a devil. Their encounters with these characters, against the backdrop of increasingly absurd radio news updates, reveal the flaws and merits of their relationship and their respective worldviews.

The Play for Voices production of Please Enter Destination was directed by Jen Zoble. Wayne Shulmister designed and mixed the audio. The role of Helena was played by Michaela Morton, Honza by Imran Sheikh, Angela the GPS by Carol Monda, and the Radio Announcer and the Devil by Mark Rayment.

Play for Voices audio plays are recorded at Harvestworks by audio engineer Kevin Ramsay.

Play for Voices is produced by Matt Fidler, Anne Posten, Katrin Redfern, and Jen Zoble.

About the Author and Translator

Tereza Semotamová (author) is a Czech screenwriter, journalist, radio editor, and translator from the German. She holds a degree in screenwriting and German language and literature, and is a regular contributor to Czech Radio, the country’s national radio company. Tereza has written over a dozen radio plays and edited a number of radio shows focusing on German literature and culture. Her screenplay Tak Dobrou won the Czech edition of the NISI MASA Script Contest.

Barbora Růžičková (translator) is a translator and interpreter working between English and Czech. A native Czech, she was brought up in a bilingual environment and spent most of her childhood abroad; today, she is based in Prague, Czech Republic. Barbora holds a degree in translation and art history, and her published literary translations include two books for young adults and a series of excerpts from contemporary Scottish literature. In 2014, she took part in the Martha’s Vineyard Writers Residency program.

The Czech song featured in Please Enter Destination is "Včera neděle byla" ("Sunday Was Yesterday"). It can be purchased on iTunes or at https://www.supraphonline.cz/album/231866-legendarni-ceskoslovenske-slagry.

Music: Jiří Šlitr

Lyrics: Jiří Suchý

Voice: Pavlína Filipovská

Orchestra of the Semafor Theatre, directed by Ferdinand Havlík

(P) 1960 SUPRAPHON a.s.

Recording used with the permission of Supraphon a.s.

Please Enter Destination was the second of the three winners of the 2016 audio drama in translation contest Play for Voices held jointly with Words Without Borders, which published the script of each winning audio play. To read Please Enter Destination, go here: https://www.wordswithoutborders.org/article/october-2017-turkish-short-stories-please-enter-destination-semotamova.

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