The scenario of the fairy tale Three Nuts for Cinderella was written by Pavlíček based on Božena Němcová’s model. However, the headlines mention Bohumila Zelenková, who patronized him because Pavlíček was banned from cultural activities by the communist regime.
A lifelong supporter of social justice, former holder of the Order of Labor and laureate of the Klement Gottwald State Prize, he signed Charter 77, went to prison and closed the door to his professions.
František Pavlíček with Jiřina Jirásková
And he was blessed with them. “I came to Prague from the Wallachian countryside and watched how radio is made. A friend took me to the TV while I was eating my way through. I left the TV to see how the movie was being made, and after the movie I peeked back at the theater,” Pavlíček said.
He claimed to have spent twenty or twenty-five good years learning “how to do things”. He also got a taste of the position – in the late 1960s he was the director of the Theater in Vinohrady, from which he was dismissed in 1970. After November 1989, he worked for over a year as director of Czechoslovak Radio. However, he is mainly remembered for his work for film and television.
Based on his text, Labyrinth of the Heart was created in 1961, a year later Hot Heart and in 1967 Markéta Lazarová directed by František Vláčil, to which Pavlíček, according to his own words, dedicated three years of his life.
His screenplay was also used for the film Tony, you jumped out, and in 1971, already on the spur of the moment, there was a television adaptation of Babička by Božena Němcová directed by Antonín Moskalyk. “I was honored that the author of the script František Pavlíček and the director Moskalyk chose me for the role of Viktorka,” recalled Libuše Geprtová.
Similarly, Jaromír Hanzlík mentioned that thanks to Pavlíčk’s bet “on the risk card” he once found himself on the Vinohrady scene. After all, Pavlíček was always close to the actors, even though he once promised his parents that he would never join the theater.
After the change in political circumstances, Pavlíček rarely returned to author’s work. Coincidentally, the last of the feature films whose screenplay he wrote was the fairy tale, Královský slib from 2001, which was filmed by Kryštof Hanzlík.
