Stanislav Neumann: The fairy-tale cook was awaiting execution in prison. The death of his son affected him the most

Stanislav Neumann was born on July 16, 1902 in Žižkov, Prague. His father was the poet Stanislav Kostka Neumann and his mother was the publisher Kamila Neumannová. However, both had different ideas about their son’s profession. Although his mother wanted him to become a bank clerk, after finishing school in 1921, Stanislav went in a completely different direction. He decided to step onto a path where acting boards mean the world. He was helped by well-known poets and actors who often visited the family at their home.

Stanislav went through a number of renowned stages, including the Liberated Theater, the Vlasta Buriana Theater and the National Theatre. During his career, he played approximately 300 theater and 100 film roles. Among his most famous figures is King v Proud princesshead chef at Princess with a gold stargrandfather Pšuk v Darbujan and Pandrhola and the Omnimor devil in the movie Games with the devil. He was an actor with a distinctive and unmistakable intonation of voice.

During the Second World War, Stanislav Neumann joined the anti-Nazi resistance, where he was very involved. A significant moment came on May 5, 1945, when he accompanied a truck filled with weapons and ammunition during the Prague Uprising. In doing so, he was arrested by an SS unit and imprisoned in the Loreto monastery, where he awaited his execution, which was scheduled for May 9. However, fate decided otherwise and was on his side. On May 8, the Germans ended the war and cowardly fled. And it was this moment that saved his life. However, his activity did not end there, and after liberation he became an active and passionate member of the Communist Party.

With his wife, Stanislav Neumann had a son, who was also named Stanislav, after his father. During the Second World War, Stanislav Jr. was imprisoned in a concentration camp in Terezín, for active participation in the resistance. When the war ended, the father went to the Terezin fortress, where he decided to look for his son. After several days of searching, he found Stanislav in serious condition, very sick and exhausted. To save his life, he tried to get him to safety. After recovering, the son graduated from the Sorbonne in Paris and became a successful poet, following in his grandfather’s footsteps.

Still, he was not satisfied with his life and ended it prematurely and tragically. The fragile soul of the artist fell into deep depression. Young Stanislav ended up in a psychiatric hospital, where he committed suicide in the early 1970s. He was disillusioned with the communist regime, which he initially supported, but disagreed with its totalitarian methods, limiting educational opportunities for young people and expelling honest members from its ranks. In the farewell letter he left in his room, he wrote that he could not live without the party, but neither with the party.

I know that I owed a lot to Tyl Kalafun, even though I played him many times to sold-out audiences in Národní and outside Prague. But Kalafuna was and will always be a big milestone for me on the way to finding a person on stage.

The death of Stanislav Neumann’s son deeply affected him and he was never able to recover from it. He was never the same again. In the most difficult moments, some of his acting colleagues from the theater supported him. As a show of solidarity with him, for example, the actor František Smolík returned his party ID to the Communist Party. Neumann also worked as a teacher at DAMU. His students included prominent actors, including Luděk Kopřiva, Milan Nedela, Jiřina Jirásková and Irena Kačírková.

Although Stanislav was a convinced communist, he showed himself very humane and was a particularly sensitive person who tried to understand the problems of others. He also liked to help other people. He did not have time to watch his last TV appearance as a woodcutter in the series German Fairy Tales. Stanislav Neumann died in February 1975 at the age of 72.