2013 Essays

Thea Červenková

Bláhová, Jindřiška

When Thea (Terezie) Červenková left Czechoslovakia in 1923 to start a new life with her brother in Latin America, her passport stated that she was a writer and a journalist. However, she was more than that. At the age of forty-one she was leaving behind at least two careers—one in writing and a shorter, but no less prolific career in the film industry, where she worked as a director, a screenwriter, a journalist, and, most importantly, as an entrepreneur. During a five-year period, from 1918 to 1923, she translated continuity titles, wrote eight scripts, directed eight films, wrote articles for the trade film magazine Československý film, and cofounded, with cameraman Josef Brabec, her own film company, Filmový ústav, which she ran until her departure for Rio de Janeiro in 1923. We learn this from an undated interview with her closest coworker, Josef Brabec (Josefem Brabcem), who also recalls her as a woman with a “business spirit,” who managed a guesthouse in Prague (Brabcem 3).