The Divine Hat

Václav Kliment Klicpera: The Miraculous Hat. A comedy about two poor students, an inherited hat, and a swindled miser. Human foolishness is eternal, as is the desire to get for free what others must pay for. This well-proven truth is what poor students Strnad and Křepelka, the main characters of Václav Kliment Klicpera's comedy The Miraculous Hat, are betting on. Strnad and Křepelka have been living on credit at an inn for some time, hoping that Strnad's expected inheritance from his grandfather will help them settle their bills. But when it finally arrives, it turns out that instead of money, the ancestor has bequeathed his grandson only an old tricorn hat. Perhaps it could be sold, but that would require finding a buyer willing to pay thousands for the unsightly headwear. Klicpera wrote his comedy about a swindled and ultimately reformed miser in 1817, and it was first published in 1820 in the first volume of Klicpera's Theatre. The author revised it for the second edition in 1848. It soon joined the ranks of Klicpera's popular comedies, such as The Evil Stag, Comedy on the Bridge, Hadrian of Řimsy, Everyone Something for the Homeland, The Liar and His Family, and The Fowler. Cast and characters: Strnad (Jiří Klem), Křepelka (Petr Svojtka), Koliáš, Strnad's uncle (Oldřich Musil), Barnabáš, the innkeeper (Čestmír Řanda), Bětuška, his daughter (Jaroslava Obermaierová), Karel, a young gamekeeper (Jan Faltýnek), Pohořalský, a songwriter (Vladimír Šmeral), Zvonek (Ladislav Trojan) and Datlík (Pavel Rubeš). Recorded in 1975. Directed by Vladimír Gromov.