The Prague Post Online: Tempo: Cultural recap

October 12th, 2008

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Cultural recap

A look back at the year in music, film, art and food

January 3rd, 2008 issue

You can wax eloquent about high art and low budgets, singing, dancing, playing, performing and painting, but at the end of the year everyone has just one important question: How was the food?

The good news is that, for the first time in a long time, the food was much better this year. Once a culinary backwater, Prague is quickly moving up the upscale dining ladder with an infusion of new restaurants, chefs and ideas. Never mind that most of us can’t afford it — anything that generally lifts the taste levels in this town is a blessing.

Otherwise, it was the usual mix of comedy and tragedy on the arts and culture front, with the big theaters feeling the budget pinch, too few quality films in the cineplexes and too many fine musicians playing to too-small crowds. Herewith, a recap of the year as our critics and writers experienced it.

— Compiled by Frank Kuznik, Steffen Silvis, Dave Faries, Darrell Jónsson and Mimi Rogers

OPERA

Along with plummeting arts budgets, opera productions took a nose dive this past year, with low-budget sets and baffling staging the norm, punctuated by dismayingly few bright spots.

The first premiere of the year, Czech composer Tomáš Hanzlík’s Lacrimae Alexandri Magni at the Estates Theater in January, set the tone for much of what was to follow. Ostensibly a story about Alexander the Great’s formative ambitions, the piece was performed oratorio-style by what appeared to be half a dozen Teletubbies perched atop impossibly high chairs. A pointless trio of slapstick clowns added to the carnival atmosphere, with the biggest star on the stage, Soňa Červená, confined to a masked speaking role. The absurd staging made it difficult to appreciate Hanzlík’s score, which broke no new ground but was otherwise very pleasant, and might be worth resurrecting in a better context.

Photo copyright of Státní opera Praha,

Style and substance. Manon Lescaut, one of the few successes this season. enlarge

A badly needed infusion of fresh ideas and voices came to town in March via Opera 2007, the biannual showcase for the country’s best opera ensembles. Generally speaking, the young talent on display was encouraging, reflecting a vibrant and thriving scene in what is supposed to be a dying art form. Unfortunately, the production that probably left the strongest impression was the Silesian Theatre Opava’s version of Švanda dudák, Jaromír Weinberger’s 1927 gem. It was recast as a Nazi drama, and after the stunned silence during the opening minutes, you could feel the embarrassment and outrage ripple through the audience as storm troopers usurped what should be a lovely folk tale.

May brought a 400th anniversary production of Monteverdi’s Orfeo, said to be the first real opera, to the Estates Theater. This reviewer found the evening as tedious as the Teletubby performance, with all the singers moving in slow motion and a tiresome procession of baffling props used to symbolize ... what? It was never clear. However, a number of viewers commented afterward how much they liked the production. In fact, one of the city’s most knowledgeable Baroque music aficionados liked it so much that he and his wife went twice. I was also wrong about the production’s short run; it’s coming back in late January, so you’ll have a chance to judge for yourself.

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A bit of Baroque. Classical music with a dash of commedia with Collegium Marianum's Les Fables de La Fontaine. enlarge

May also brought two of the strongest productions of the year, highlighting opposite ends of Puccini’s career. At the State Opera, Manon Lescaut got a great airing with Christina Vasileva breaking hearts in the title role and Slovak director Jozef Bednárik giving the piece a big dose of Broadway glitz. Some of his staging choices seemed odd, but overall the production was inventive, the cast uniformly strong and the visuals a treat for the eye.

At the National Theater, La Fanciulla Del West played like a Hollywood Western, with a cinematic opening and closing, and big sets in between straight out of John Ford. The title role of Minnie is difficult to sing, one of the reasons the opera isn’t staged more often. But both of the alternating leads, Eva Urbanová (doing everything but twirling her six-gun) and Anda-Louise Bogza, were strong. Neither of them, however, won the Komerční banka Award for the 2006-07 season, which went instead to German singer John Wegner for his portrayal of Sheriff Jack Rance. Wegner also made a strong impression with Prague audiences singing Wotan in the National Theater’s 2005 production of Wagner’s Ring Cycle, memorably conducted by John Fiore, who also did a fine job with La Fanciulla.

In June, a ray of sunshine: With Aprile Milo sidelined by illness, singing star Michelle Crider came to town on short notice to sing the title role in Tosca. She was tremendous, especially considering the abbreviated rehearsal time, turning in a powerful performance with a world-class voice that ranged from passionate to defiant. Played on Josef Svoboda’s riveting sets, it was an enthralling evening.

You could almost hear the air coming out of the tires in September, when the new season opened with the National Theater’s Hubička. A minor work by Smetana, it was given TV-style treatment by Slovak director Marián Chudovský, and played straight to the hearts and sensibilities of Czech audiences. Nothing wrong with that, but the one-dimensional approach and lackluster singing and staging made for a flat evening.

Norma, which premiered at the National Theater two months later, wasn’t much better, but featured strong singing performances by Olga Makarina in the title role and Carmen Oprisanu as the high priestess Adalgisa. There was some griping about their singing after the first premiere, though that was apparently because they had been rehearsed almost to hoarseness. They came back stronger in the second premiere, though weak direction kept the performance from really catching fire, even though Norma and her lover Pollione die in a bonfire in the closing scene. For good measure, in this production they were also shot. Talk about overkill.

So the best thing to say about 2007 is that it’s over. But there’s reason to be optimistic about the new year, which will bring two fresh productions at the financially strapped State Opera: a reprise of Leoncavallo’s La Boheme in March with Hilary Griffiths at the podium again, and a brand-new production of Wagner’s Flying Dutchman in May, with French conductor Guillaume Tourniaire. At the National Theater, local composer Aleš Březina unveils Tomorrow will..., his look at the communist show trial of Milada Horáková, in April. Then a quick double-header to close out the season: Verdi’s rollicking Falstaff in May, and yet another Bartered Bride in June, this one giving young director Magdalena Švecová, who has been making a name for herself at the J.K. Tyl Theater in Plzeň, a chance to show what she can do on the country’s main stage.

— Frank Kuznik

POP MUSIC

If anything can be said about Prague this year, it’s that there was certainly no shortage of live music. In 2001 when I was first asked by The Prague Post to keep an eye out for world-music events, there may have been three or four events a year that qualified in that category for review. In 2007, there were often three or more quality world-music related events in a week, not to mention the occasional competing of two world-beat events in a single night. Experimental and electronic music as well, due in great part to the efforts of Školská 28, Stimulfest and N.O.D. Gallery, has firmly made a place in the local musical landscape. Whether talking about flamenco, ambient or rock, in nearly every popular music and

sub-genre world-class music has found its way to live Prague audiences in 2007.

Martin Boltík/eri-ador.com

Kurtis Blow's memorable February concert. One of the pop music highlights of an otherwise crowded calendar. enlarge

Early in the year, the only act that could possibly be accused of placing Prague in the backwater tour category were the Leningrad Cowboys, who conspicuously arrived without their legendary 160-member choir and the motorized grinders they use for grinding their frets during passionate guitar solos. Likely many of the audience goggling the two shapely dancers in their entourage didn’t notice that even with three rhythm guitarists the Cowboys could hardly lift a song off of the ground.

No worries. Superb musicianship had reigned supreme elsewhere in Prague, as earlier in January Boban and Marko Marković provided one of their best performances in the country yet. Prague’s Akropolis Palác’s early-19th-century architecture and the Markovic brass band were in perfect harmony. Unlike some of Markovic’s early concerts in Prague, the size and atmosphere of Akropolis seemed to fit the brass band like a comfortable old shoe.

Another concert with a perfect venue match was Kurtis Blow and crew’s February performance at Lucerna Music Bar. “We are not here to murder anybody,” KB matter-of-factly told the audience after a sizzling intro rendition of “The Breaks.” Such nonviolent statements may seem an odd thing from KB, the original bare-torso, gold-chained rapper who first broke the form into the hit charts in the late ’70s, but, for MC KB, hip-hop was a peace, happiness and community thing from the very beginning. Now, as one of the most active statesmen of old-school hip-hop, KB has updated his mixes, collaborates with his son KB, Jr., for freestyle edge, and travels with the gravity defying break-dancer Iron Monkey.

The uncanny generosity of spirit KB projected is the one thing though that made his Prague appearance one of the most memorable concerts of the year. Local b-boys and b-girls eagerly joined in onstage with break dance moves to KB’s invitation, as he led the audience through sing-a-long choruses to hits like “Basketball” and “If I Ruled the World.” By the end of the show, KB was in the audience singing and giving out stacks of free promo CDs, while local b-dancers and Iron Monkey back onstage danced into dawn.

Old-school may be a relative term to many, yet in 2007 there were at least three music legends passing through town either pushing or past the 70 year mark. Surprisingly though John Mayall, Kris Kristofferson and former Mothers of Invention member Don Preston all delivered excellent shows. Mayall commanded a full house at Prague’s Na Folimance sports hall, with the sort of smooth blues he is legendary for. Kristofferson delivered a gutsy solo performance that was even engaging to those sitting in the back rows of Prague’s 2,500-seat Congress Center. Yet it was Preston’s Akashic Ensemble show at Lucerna that proved septuagenarians can still break some sonic barriers. Preston’s electronic keyboard prowess combined with André Cholmondeley’s psychedelic-jazz guitar and Cheri Jiosne’s electronic percussion provided the evening with plenty of musical surprises. Not to mention the uproarious laughter that was generated via Preston’s new-age satires and timeless Zappa-era R&B spoofs.

For those looking for emerging waves of more contemporary rock ’n’ roll, Sound Scrape promotions and Prague’s Silver Rocket label continued this year to present innovators drawn from both local and international talent. Most of these shows were at the off-the-beaten track Klub 007 in Prague 6. Last March those who ventured to 007 were rewarded with an electrifying night that included Prague’s Rány těla (aka The Bodywounds), and the imaginative Singapore Sling from Iceland. Sound Scrape also produced an astonishing show at Akropolis that featured the haunting combination of industrial rock with backwoods American folklore as explored by Colorado’s Woven Hand. Also at Akropolis later in December, Silver Rocket combined a mesmerizing night with the United Kingdom’s Godflesh founder Justin Broadwick’s new band Jesu and the Belgian’s ambient drone project Fear Falls Burning.

With reasonable turnouts, if not sold-out events, it seems the city is willing to accept new threads of music, yet the venues are often a weak match for the acts they attract. It’s ironic that many of the city’s more innovative rock music events take place at Strahov’s 007, which remains challenged both in its audience capacity size and remote location, whereas better situated downtown venues often have a re-hash of revival bands and DJs playing nearly nightly. Archa Divadlo has begun to take on their fair share of music events, but, with the rare exception of acts like Hector Zazou and Coco Rosie, the full multimedia capacities of the space have rarely been put to full use. Roxy and Akropolis are good venues, but when full to capacity are far from comfortable places to see a concert. Sadly, the spaces often need to be full as possible in order to cost-justify not only the ongoing concert but also whatever losses promoters have incurred due to previous gigs. Much of this is driven by the city’s lack of centrally located venues with the capacity of accommodating 1,000-1,500 people. Despite such complaints, the biggest problem for Prague music lovers this year has been choosing which events to go to each week, from an increasingly dense list of possibilities. But that’s a complaint we can happily live with.

— Darrell Jónsson

VISUAL ARTS

The end of any year signals awards season, and 2007 saw the addition of a couple new prizes to the roster of annual visual arts honors. The NG 333 Prize for artists under 33 from the Czech Republic and Slovakia was awarded for the first time this year by the National Gallery. The prize brings a cash award of 333,000 Kč plus acquisition of the winning work by the National Gallery. From a field of 11 finalists, the art group Ztohoven won the inaugural award. The group had grabbed headlines earlier by hacking into state-run broadcaster Czech Television and replacing a segment of serene footage of the Krkonoše Mountains with the image of a mushroom cloud rising over the countryside. They left their calling card by tagging the scene with their Web site address.

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Work by Jindřich Chalupecký Award winner Eva Koťátková. enlarge

The Jindřich Chalupecký Award, which was established by Václav Havel, Jiří Kolář and Teodor Pištěk in 1990 to recognize artists under the age of 35, was bestowed for the 18th time this year. Eva Koťátková was picked from a group of five finalists. Her installations aim to take objects out of their typical environments and form them into new hybrid, nonfunctional objects. The format of the finalists’ show stirred up some controversy. The organizers decided to give each finalist a solo show in a different independent “underground” gallery. Since the galleries were scattered throughout Prague, it was a chore for viewers to visit all of the shows, and additionally the artists lost out on the opportunity to have their work displayed in a more prestigious venue with exposure to a wider audience. The “Finale” show has been like a lost orphan, wandering among different galleries and even cities over the past several years. It will be interesting to see what the Chalupecký committee comes up with for the 2008 Finale show.

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Work by Jan Jakub Kotík, who died recently. enlarge

The State Prize for Art and Architecture, which was established by the Culture Ministry in 2003 and recognizes artists and architects who have made a significant contribution to Czech culture, went to veteran artist Karel Malich, who is best known for his large hanging wire sculptures that embody cosmic geometry and latent kinetic energy.

Another new award was established for which “older” artists — that is, over 35 — are eligible. Named for the artist Jiří Kovanda, the winner was Vladimír Skrepl (born in 1955). The concept of the award is to give recognition to an artist from the middle and older generations through a process of nominations by a wide range of younger members of the art community. The following year’s award would always be held under the auspices of the laureate of this previous year. Selections were also made by the committee for the best solo and group show of the year: Markéta Othová’s solo show “Talk With Her” at Galerie Jiří Švestka and the group show “Punctum” at Futura, curated by Václav Magrid.

The year 2007 saw the opening of a few notable new galleries. CIANT Gallery in Prague 3 opened in April with the aim of showcasing projects at the crossroads of art, science and new technologies. In November, the new gallery tranzitdisplay opened in Prague 2, a rebirth of sorts of the former Galerie Display and the Tranzit project, whose focus has been cross-border cooperation among artists and curators. The new space is co-directed by prominent curators Vít Havránek and David Kulhánek.

In 2008, gallery-goers can look forward to the reopening of one of the city’s most venerable spaces: the Václav Špála Gallery on Národní třída. Its golden era was the second half of the 1960s, when its curator was the theoretician and critic Chalupecký. But even throughout the 1990s it maintained a pretty high standard. In recent years, the gallery was rented out to exhibitors and had no coherent exhibition plan; its closure at the end of 2006 was a coup de grace. The space is set to reopen in January under the guidance of well-known critic Lenka Lindaurová and artists and educators Pavel Humhal and Vladimír Skrepl. In June, the Špála Gallery revives the tradition of hosting a solo show for the past year’s Chalupecký laureate.

As the year drew to a close, the art community lost a talented young artist. Jan Jakub Kotík died Dec. 13 after a long battle with cancer. Kotík was born in 1972 in the U.S. city of Buffalo, New York, to Czech parents, and was descended from a prominent artistic family; he also was the great-great grandson of first Czechoslovak President T.G. Masaryk. After moving to the Czech Republic in 2000, he soon caught the attention of curators and viewers with his subversively humorous and cleverly constructed objects and installations that criticized the power structures of giant corporations and the state, and pointed out the connections between them. Hail to the Chief, a tower of speakers embroidered with the U.S. presidential seal and pumping out a riff from Black Sabbath’s heavy-metal classic “Iron Man,” is among the many noteworthy works he exhibited locally. His actively engaged art earned him a nomination for the Jindřich Chalupecký Award in 2006.

— Mimi Fronczak Rogers

FILM

I’m addicted to lists and listmaking, a mania for which the Greeks must have had a word, though I haven’t found it. So, in the hope, dear reader, that you are just as much of an “itemizophile” (well, why not?) as I, or are too hard-pressed for time to wade through too much text, I’ll present my yearly roundup of films as an inventory — with a few asides.

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Guest star, Emil Jannings. The Willem Breuker Kollektief aid Murnau's Faust. enlarge

Best 10 films screened in Prague:

1. David Lynch’s Inland Empire

2. The divided at birth Grindhouse films — Quentin Tarantino’s Death Proof and Robert Rodriguez’s Planet Terror

3. A diptych of a different sort: Clint Eastwood’s Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima

4. Andrea Arnold’s Red Road

5. Christopher Nolan’s The Prestige

6. Danny Boyle’s intelligent sci-fi Sunshine

7. Christian Volckman’s superb motion-captured anime noir, Renaissance

8. John Curran’s The Painted Veil

9. Florian Henckel Von Donnersmarck’s Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others). A well deserved Oscar

10. MOFFOM’s screening of Kote Miqaberidze’s silent Soviet slapstick, Moya Babushka. Imagine Harold Lloyd reinvented by Constructivists

Honorable mentions:

1. The Queen with the excellent Helen Mirren

2. Once — the smallest and best of the year’s musicals, though there was much to enjoy in Dream Girls, Hairspray and Across the Universe as well

3. Snow Cake

4. Sicko

5. Hot Fuzz

6. Little Children

7. Angel (exquisite camp)

8. Zodiac (which disintegrates in the film’s third act)

9. The Simpsons Movie

10. Disturbia

Czech cinema (from good to bad):

1. Alice Nellis’ Tajnosti, with a warm-hearted performance from Iva Bittová

2. Jiří Vejdělek’s Václav, with an equally fine performance from Ivan Trojan

3. Jan Hřebejk’s Medvídek. In many ways the strongest film this year, though Hřebejk seems to be repeating himself.

4. Jedné noci v jednom městě (One Night in One City), Jan Balej’s superb stop-action puppetry

5. Jiří Menzel’s tired I Served the King of England, which somehow failed to fully grasp the great humanity in Hrabal’s beautiful novel

6. Gympl. The usually good Tomáš Vorel at his laziest

7. Vratné lahve. Someone please explain why the Svěrák family has such a high reputation here

8. Goya’s Ghosts. Not really a Czech film, but that old pro Miloš Forman turned in one of the most embarrassing, bloated epics of the past few years. Not a good year for the top Czech directors

The nadir of the art form:

1. You, Me and Dupree. I would have slashed my wrists, too

2. Heartbreak Kid

3. More 9/11 whining from the United States with The Brave One, complete with revenge fantasies

4. I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry

5. The Number 23, and the “Number 2” that Jim Carrey’s career has become

6. Mr. Bean’s Holiday. Has retardation ever been so unamusing?

7. Hostel

8. The Reaping

9. Hannibal Rising

10. And, finally, the true bottom of a seeping barrel, Norbit

Three too many:

1. Spider-Man 3

2. Ocean’s 13

3. The Pirates of the Carribean: At World’s End

Twenty-five too many:

1. Rocky … (fill in the blank)

Lastly, films that gained either high critical praise or vitriolic disagreements elsewhere in the world that Czech distributors didn’t think were as worthy of screenings as Norbit and Saw IV:

The History Boys, Hollywoodland, Brick, Bubble, Marie Antoinette, Bug, Away from Her (scheduled, but never screened), Rendition (also scheduled and then yanked), This is England, Gone Baby Gone and Lars and the Real Girl.

For a look at some of the films scheduled for 2008, see page B9 in The Prague Post’s Night & Day entertainment tabloid. Happy New Year!

— Steffen Silvis

CLASSICAL MUSIC

So much music, so little time.

Literally almost every night of the week there is a classical concert worth hearing in Prague. The orchestras comprise the cream of the crop, but a seemingly endless supply of outstanding chamber groups and soloists fill the smaller halls, churches and music academies. Even for a music critic it’s impossible to keep up with it all. So herewith, some personal notes and reflections from selected concerts of the past year.

Rolando Villazón was one of the biggest names to pass through town this year, packing Obecní dům once again for a recital in late February. He was good but not as strong as in his November 2005 performance here, showing the strains of the increasing demands on his time and voice. But he’s lost nothing in the charm department, making a nod to “El Presidente” (King Klaus) sitting in the presidential box overlooking the stage, and scrapping the planned second half of his program to share his newly recorded zarzuelas with the audience.

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Prague Autumn is becoming as important as its spring counterpart. Valery Gergiev took the podium in one of the most fiery of evenings. enlarge

In late March the Czech Philharmonic mounted another fine contemporary music series, this time focusing on the Scandinavian countries. It’s too bad this series draws such small audiences; the program is excellent, and many of the composers are there in person for the performances. Czech Philharmonic Director Václav Riedlbauch deserves credit for continuing what is basically a money-losing proposition, especially with the organizers of the Modern Music Marathon throwing in the towel because of shrinking crowds at Archa. Kudos as well to the French Institute and Prague Philharmonia for keeping up the excellent “Beauty of Today” modern music series, which plays monthly at Švandovo divadlo.

Prague Spring fielded an inordinate number of local performers, but perhaps we’re spoiled by regular access to such outstanding young soloists as pianists Jitka Čechová and Ivo Kahánek and violinist Pavel Šporcl. And there’s no arguing with visiting names like conductors Sir Charles Mackerras and Michael Tilson Thomas, the latter leading two strong performances by the San Francisco Symphony. Other memorable standouts included Gidon Kremer’s Kremerata Baltica ensemble, the impressive Finnish team of conductor Sakari Oramo and his wife, singer Anu Kuomsi, and the Willem Breuker Kollektief’s unforgettable live score to Murnau’s Faust. And the performance by the China Broadcast Chinese Orchestra on traditional instruments was a revelation.

For a time last summer, Carmina Burana seemed to be everywhere, most memorably in a June performance at the Rudolfinum by the Czech Philharmonic, Prague Philharmonic Choir and Kühn Children’s Choir as part of the Czech-German Culture Year. It was one of those rare nights when everything came together perfectly, with Orff’s powerful cantata thundering off the stage as it should.

For entirely different reasons, the performance by the Czech Radio Symphony Orchestra to open the Český Krumlov International Music Festival a month later was also memorable. As the orchestra played, perched precariously on a cliff below the castle, storm clouds gathered and, halfway through the performance, both orchestra and audience scattered as large raindrops began to fall. Fearing that their show would be washed out, the organizers set off their post-concert fireworks. Suddenly, the storm passed, the orchestra reconvened for an anti-climactic finish and the crowd moved to the Eggenberg Brewery garden for a late, late party.

The best summer music series in Prague, Collegium Marianum’s Summer Festivities of Early Music, was again very good, with a series of Baroque programs at some of the city’s most interesting venues. Increasingly, the festival is diversifying into drama and dance, a move that looked smart with the comedies Les Fables de La Fontaine and Les Fourberies de Scapin playing to audiences at Divadlo ABC, and a dance program that worked surprisingly well outdoors at Vrtba Garden.

Prague Proms gets more ambitious every summer, diversifying its programming and venues, opening with Eva Urbanová. Prague favorite Garrich Ohlsson was a no-show, but otherwise the mix of jazz, classical and show music worked well, especially on the “American” and “Night in Versailles” evenings, the latter at the splendiferous Troja Chateau. Czech National Symphony Orchestra Manager Jan Hasenöhrl has turned out to be a canny programmer. Say what you will about the “Hollywood Night” of chestnuts by Bernstein, Gershwin and Williams — it packed the house at Obecní dům at a time of year when no one goes to classical concerts.

Prague Autumn featured a number of strong performances by the likes of the Russian State Symphony Orchestra, superstar conductor Valery Gergiev and the always-excellent Bamberger Symphony. Unfortunately, the big story was festival director Pavel Špiroch’s tiff with pianist Helene Grimaud, which led to a cancellation of the Staatskapelle Dresden concert. Accusations flew from both sides, but it was clear that the source of the problem was Špiroch’s drinking. One night, he was so drunk that he fell down the stairs of the Rudolfinum auditorium trying to make his way to the door. The only thing more astonishing than Špiroch’s drunken behavior is that no one seems bothered by it.

Strings of Autumn continued its run as one of Prague’s best music festivals, combining classical, jazz and experimental programming with an alchemy that draws bigger crowds every year. A choral group called the Russian Patriarchate Choir sold out two nights at the Czech Museum of Music. But the big hit, at least for classical fans, was the opening concert with tenor Ian Bostridge backed by Britain’s Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. French conductor Michel Swierczewski put together a fine crossover Nouba program with the Prague Philharmonia at the Rudolfinum, where jazz fans filled every seat for the last two concerts with the Brad Mehldau Trio and Regina Carter Quintet.

All of which neglects Lang Lang, whom some Czech Philharmonic veterans declared the best soloist they had ever played with; the sterling string quartet series at Bertramka that museum director Lenka Pokorná put together; another engaging Young Prague festival, which had better success after it was moved to early September; and the surprisingly good Malá Strana Chamber Festivities series at Knight’s Hall in the Senate in October. Worthy efforts all, that hopefully will be reprised in 2008.

— Frank Kuznik

FOOD

The year buzzed with great names, grand openings and a lot of talk.

Rumor swirled about Burger King’s interest in the city. Hard Rock Café actually sent a team to scout locations and interview potential managers. But these were just whispers. A few people wondered aloud, as the first three months passed, about the possibility of some restaurant or other picking up a Michelin star. Conversations petered out after the 2007 red guide snubbed Prague once again.

Essensia in the Mandarin Oriental revived the thought by inviting a series of starred chefs from more fortunate culinary climes — as CzecHouse in the Hilton had done the year before. Then word spread that Gordon Ramsay, with 10 Michelin stars in his pocket already, planned to open a version of London’s maze in the new Hilton Old Town. Suddenly, talk erupted anew, raising stakes for 2008.

A Seattle coffee chain proved by far the year’s biggest source of scuttlebutt. Starbucks, people said, was hunting for a spot in Prague’s historic center. They actually spoke with the owners of Paneria before turning elsewhere — rumors pegged them in the Palladium, in Pankrác and, finally replacing Square in Malá Strana. Negotiators have apparently settled on the latter two spots, perhaps the most settled discussion in a cacophonous season.

VLADIMÍR WEISS/THE PRAGUE POST

Chefs at the Prague Food Festival. From left: Jerome Lorieux (La Provence), Vladimír Čech (V Zátiší), Marek Purkert (Mlýnec), Zbyněk Hájek (Bellevue), Pavel Maurer (organizer), Ari Munandar (Mandarin Oriental). enlarge

It was also another banner year for raw fish fanatics, and Prague’s sushi trend continued. Gozen, a good all-Japanese—as opposed to the usual Korean hybrid—opened a space in Smíchov, as did another Sushi Point. Dejvice welcomed Sakura, and New Town’s Millhouse Sushi underwent a quick sprucing. Meanwhile, a stand in Světozor passage now sells items for take away. Coffee Heaven offers packaged rolls. Even Le Patio’s normally Mediterranean menu yielded space for a sushi bar.

More importantly, fine-dining momentum, built in part by a more demanding audience and a scattering of good new restaurants, picked up tremendous — perhaps unrelenting — speed. Early in the year, the Ambiente Group gambled on a luxurious, multi-course concept called La Degustation. Serving tasting-menu portions, its meals meander through a dozen well-conceived plates over three hours. Allegro lured chef Andrea Accordi from a Michelin star lodge in Florence, spurring a “race” between the Four Season’s Italian restaurant and Ramsay’s import, maze.

Almost lost in the flurry of high-end openings (which also included Le Pavillon — a Prague 4 sibling to Le Terroir), the thoughtful fusion of Monsoon turned Dejvice into a foodie destination, Man-na found demand for true Korean dishes and Masala brought British Indian cuisine to the city.

The latter was one example of an encouraging trend: decent midrange openings, the kind suitable both for wallet-sparing dates and everyday dining.

Until 2007, options in this category were limited. Then a string of places, varied in style and cuisine, began setting up shop. La Torreto introduced al dente pasta to Prague 10. Park opened a quirky space down the hill from Havlíčkovy sady, complete with an outdoor play area for kids. Tucked almost under the Nusle Bridge, Babylon decided to span the eastern Mediterranean on a budget. In the center, Louka Lu (Balkan) and Le Bifteque (Continental) tipped the quality/cost scale in favor of the consumer.

Even Czech icon Karel Gott found this niche appealing, using Gott Gallery to show off not only his “enormous” artistic talent (you had to see the painting, since removed), but also a range of not-at-all-bad menu offerings.

A couple of interesting places broke free of the common pub monotony dominating the bottom rung. Restaurant O3 turned a nondescript Žižkov storefront into an experiment on random creative spurts, serving everything from frog legs to cold peach soup at hospoda prices. And parents of a small child set up Cristoff as a family-friendly hangout: one room stocked with toys and games, the rest a space to sample their eclectic listings.

As this remarkable year progressed, Prague’s diners paused to celebrate. Pavel Maurer — publisher of the Grand Restaurant guide — took fine dining to the masses, hosting the inaugural Prague Food Festival. Featuring more than 30 of the country’s better restaurants in a carnival atmosphere, with booths and music and other programs, the outdoor extravaganza drew more than 8,000 people over three days. The crowds shelled out close of 1 million Kč ($556,000) for quick bites and good wine (Ambiente sold 150 kilos of meat on one day alone), spurring expectations for a larger reprise in 2008.

The year also saw Prague’s one-time nemesis, stag party tours, dwindle as coarse drunks headed toward havens of cheap alcohol made accessible by the expansion of no-frills air routes. Although the roving bands of beer swilling Brits spend small fortunes at pubs, brothels and gambling bars, they also render sidewalks in the center inaccessible to those who forgot their wading boots. Riga, Kyiv and other locations “benefited” from this shift.

New and competitive restaurants, increasing awareness of good food, a market on the verge of its first ever Michelin star, an atmosphere in which even mall food courts make a splash —the events of 2007 suggest that Prague is, finally, climbing from Europe’s culinary basement.

Yes, consistency remains a problem. Kitchen staffers continue to burn meat into cinder blocks on a regular basis. And cardiologists must still anticipate busy days ahead, at least until cooks learn to lay off the salt shaker. But people enter the new year with a sense of optimism.

If there’s a downside, the run of strong openings and more discerning customers put pressure on restaurants looking to hire skilled staff. The local media report thousands of vacancies and hundreds of very desperate restaurateurs.

The year wasn’t without its problems, but so long to perhaps the best that Prague’s restaurant denizens ever witnessed.

— Dave Faries

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