Lenka Pichlíková-Burke


Lenka Pichlíková - Burke is an American actress of Czech descent, the seventh generation of her family to appear onstage since the 18th century. Her great-uncle was the noted national actor, Ladislav Pešek. While in Czechoslovakia, she performed on stage in many theatres, played in twelve films, and created over 40 television roles, rising to the rank of Advanced Master Artist. In addition to performing as a speaking actress, she was also involved professionally in classic pantomime. Since the 1980s she has resided in the United States. In the United States, she has performed onstage in speaking roles as well as in pantomime productions for more than 25 years. Since 1988, she has been a member of the Actors' Equity Association, the union which represents professional actors. In 2006 she was named the "Best Mime" of Fairfield County, Connecticut. She teaches performing arts, dramatic literature, and cultural history, and translates plays.

Biography and work

Czechoslovak period

In 1977, Lenka Pichlíková finished her studies at the Faculty of Theatre of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. She was a member of the Jiří Wolker Theatre company in Prague, where she had originally performed at the age of nine. She subsequently worked in the companies of the Theatre on the Balustrade, The Drama Club, and The Vinohrady Theatre in Prague, and performed as a guest artist in the National Theatre in Prague. Among her roles during this period was Petrunjela in Uncle Maroje by Marin Držić, and two roles in Insect Play by Karel and Josef Čapek, further Bianca in Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew, Anna in Vladislav Vančura's Peevish Summer, Anička in Josef Tajovský's Women's Law. In addition to acting onstage, she was a member of Ladislav Fialka's mime company at the Theatre on the Balustrade. She performed in a joint mime-acting production, Broom in Confusion, based on works by Molière.
as Katherina in The Taming of the Shrew.
During her career in Czechoslovakia, Lenka Pichlíková created over 40 television roles and performed in 12 Czech and European co-production feature films. The most successful of these was The Trumpet's Song, directed by Ludvík Ráža, in which she played the main role. The film, originally produced for Czechoslovak Television, won first prize at the Festival de Télévision de Monte-Carlo in 1981. She also played in films by Karel Kachyňa, Viktor Polesný, and in Jiří Krejčík's and Evald Schorm's comedies. For German television, she appeared in the series directed by Franz Peter Wirth, A Square of Sky, which was based on the experiences of Janina Dawidowicz from the Warsaw ghetto; in Die Schmuggler von Rajgrod, directed by Konrad Petzold; and in several segments of the series, The Invisible Sight, directed by Peter Hagen.

American period

Since coming to the United States in 1982, Lenka Pichlíková has acted in both university and professional theaters, including productions accredited by the Actors' Equity Association. Her roles include Masha in Chekhov's The Seagull, Yelena in Uncle Vanya and Hilda in Ibsen's The Master Builder, Lea in Wendy Kesselman's My Sister in This House, Joan in Bertolt Brecht's Saint Joan of the Stockyards, Ophelia in Müller's Hamletmachine, and Tamara Sachs in Ronald Harwood's Taking Sides. Other roles include Rosebud in Natalie Needs a Nightie and Christina in Drop Zone.
Subsequently, Lenka Pichlíková studied with Marcel Marceau in the United States, and has performed as a mime in Mexico, France, Texas, New York, and throughout Connecticut. She was a member of the blacklight theatre company, Ta Fantastika, during their New York City period, 1982 - 1984. In 1987, she performed as the lead narrator and mime in segments of The Magic Game, produced in Mexico and performed throughout the southwest United States. She has also created a character dance role, the Duchess, in the original ballet, Alice in Wonderland by Laurie Gage. Her mimodrama, Medea, and her mime performance piece, Seven Deadly Sins and a Virtue have been presented in several states. Medea, for which she wrote, directed, and played the lead, was featured in Connecticut's International Festival of Arts and Ideas in 2001. In 2006, she wrote and performed in the one-person drama, Three Women of Faith, based on the lives of the Abbess Hildegard of Bingen, Queen Sofia of Bavaria, and Katharina von Bora Luther. In 2006, she was named the Best Mime of Fairfield County, Connecticut by the area news media. In 2014 she performed in her own translation a play by Anna Hodkova, Gertrude, which is a one-woman show about queen Gertrude from Shakespeare's Hamlet.
Lenka Pichlíková currently devotes herself to her own one-person shows, mimodramas, and schools performances, as well as to acting in independent films, teaching, directing, and coaching actors.
Among her recent activities and performances are the following:
Lenka Pichlíková teaches acting, other performing arts, dramatic literature, and cultural history in the Conservatory of Theatre Arts, State University of New York at Purchase, at Fairfield University in Connecticut, and at other colleges, as well as having taught in the former School of Performing Arts of Stamford Theatre Works, a professional acting company, also in Connecticut.