“I just returned from a performance in Vlašim at the castle. It was beautiful there, the people were fantastic,” he praises. “Fortunately, I am blessed with vocal cords that last a long time. Regardless of my age, I can sing to orchestral foundations recorded, for example, forty years ago. My range has not changed. I felt very sorry for my friend Karel Gott, who not only was he seriously ill, but his vocal cords were not what they once were.’
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He had a long-standing friendship with Karl Gott. They were brought together by their interest in swing. Together they toured stock exchanges and found and exchanged interesting foreign records, which were a great rarity at the time.
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In 1963, he sang with the famous singer in the popular TV program Babiččina říkabka, the songs Dvacetikoruna ne so velíka and All the mice are behind us.
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“Karel was a rare person, hardworking, solid, kind to everyone,” recalls Josef Zíma.
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The king of the brass band, the pioneer of the musical
When the record company Supraphon approached him as a popular singer of dance songs, asking if he would like to record some folk songs, he did not refuse.
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“I have a close relationship with this music, both parents were from South Bohemia, I grew up surrounded by folk songs. I remember how there was a mobilization for defense against Hitler in 1938, soldiers camped in the village, in the evening they played songs on the harmonica around the fire, which I still sing today.”
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I wriggled around with a microphone on a cord on stage and everyone looked at me like an apparition
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In the 1970s and 1980s, the music television show Sejdeme se na Vlachovce, which he moderated and sang on for 24 years, was a huge success with viewers. Tours from all over the country were organized at Vlachovka. When the show ended in 1989, he presented brass shows on Czech Radio.
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Until now, the Region radio station presents Tu naši psinička every Saturday, where not only brass bands but also operettas and songs from the 1960s sound. Josef Zíma is also connected with the beginnings of the Czech musical.
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“The first musical was brought here by Werich and Voskovec, it was Divotvorný hrnec, which they presented in their adaptation in 1948 at today’s ABC Theatre. I played the role of Woody in it in 1965 at the Karlín Musical Theater.”
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Golden 60th in the sign of big beat: a performance with Karel Duda’s studio group.
Photo: CTK
Big musical roles also awaited him in his hometown Municipal Theaters in Prague – in Chicago, Zorbo the Greek (then called Já k čertu jiju raj), Painted on Glass, Hallelujah, dobrí lydy or Expresso Bongo.
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“It could already be called a rock and roll musical. I was wriggling around with a microphone on a cord on stage and everyone was looking at me like an apparition.”
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In 2000, the creators of the musical Monte Cristo, Karel Svoboda and Zdeněk Borovec, used his experience and cast him in the role of Abbe Faria.
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He grew up swinging
“I hate boxes: rocker, brass player, swinger. I like good music as such, genre doesn’t matter to me. But the genre must be recognized,” emphasizes the jubilant.
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“As an actor, I had to take on various tasks, I always wanted to get to know the widest possible range of my possibilities, I had and still have that in singing as well. I sing rock and roll, folk song and operetta. But I grew up on swing, Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby. Among our people, I admired Rudolf Cortez, Arnošt Kavka, Oldřich Nový, he was one of my great role models.”
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Now he prefers to listen to classical music. “I met her since childhood, my parents were very musical, my mother played the piano and sang, my father played the violin. They took me to the opera since childhood. But one has to come to serious music. I really like the melodic operas of Puccini, Verdi, Bizet. I can’t stand four hours of Wagner operas.’
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“I don’t really understand the tastes of today’s listeners and viewers,” he admits. “I don’t put everyone in the same bag, but most young people like music that doesn’t mean anything to me. I like songs with nice melodies, the current ones lack melodic ideas. Say, after a quarter of a year since you heard a contemporary song on the radio, can you sing it again?” he asks me.
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I hate boxes: rocker, brass player, swinger. I like good music as it is, genre doesn’t matter
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I admit that I don’t exactly remember any of his songs, but decades later I can immediately remember Zpívám blues just and only for you… or No, no, the most beautiful love is still shy…, which he sang with Pavlína Filipovská.
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“Well, you see, we also sang together at my birthday party. And with my friend Yvetta Simonová That’s how it is sometimes,” he adds.
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The unforgettable Prince Radovan
It is almost unthinkable to imagine the Christmas holidays without director Martin Frič’s fairy tale Princess with a Golden Star (1959) or without Frost (1964), where he lent his voice to the pink-faced Ivanka, while his wife Eva Klepáčová voiced Nastěnka.
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The role of Prince Radovan brought him great popularity, but he was already known for his theater roles, as well as from radio and television, where he performed since 1954. But at that time, there were not many television sets in households.
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He started on television as a presenter or conference host. He published a regular Monthly magazine of interesting things and good well-being.
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“I was in the military in the Military Art Ensemble, and at one performance in the Prague city library, my colleague and I sang some humorous folk songs with the harmonica. At that time, the workers of the beginning television, director Zdeněk Podskalský and dramaturg Jaroslav Dietl, came there. They offered me a TV appearance that very evening,” he recalls.
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“I will never forget my first shoot. Everything was broadcast live, in pretty terrible conditions, nothing was pre-recorded. They accidentally played a different movie that night before I announced, and I had to snap out of it. I guess I succeeded and they kept me there. After some time they figured out that I also sing. At that time, Jiří Šlitr mainly wrote the music for my songs, Miroslav Horníček wrote the words.”
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Years with Werich
Miroslav Horníček introduced him to Jan Werich in the mid-1950s. “I had guests in every program, in addition to Miroslav Horníček, Jan Werich also came there once,” he recalls.
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“When Werich was staging an Italian comedy in his theater in 1956 and needed a young man who could sing, Horníček reminded me. Mr. Werich invited me to host, my classmate Alena Vránová helped me a lot at that time, with whom we formed a couple in that game. It went well and he immediately offered me a job,” he adds.
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Alongside Jan Werich and his then stage partner Miroslav Horníček, Josef Zíma played in Těžká Barbora, Ballad of Rags, Caesar (originally a play by the Liberated Theatre).
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I had three great teachers in my life: Professor Miloš Nedbal, Mr. Werich and director Alfréd Radok
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“Werich didn’t like directing. He was not allowed to be called director, but boss. He was strict, he hated indiscipline. He put up with order, everything had to work according to him. He also had his quirks and moods,” recalls Josef Zíma.
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“Most of all, he was an extremely wise person. As a principal, he did what he could for us in that miserable time. He pulled us out of everything.
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I always say that I had three great teachers in my life: at DAMU professor Miloš Nedbal, Mr. Werich and the director Alfréd Radok, with whom I played in the Chamber Theater in Rolland’s Play of Love and Death in 1964. It was a great honor for me that he was not afraid to entrust me with a big dramatic role, even though I was known as a singer.”
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What did Werich personally help him with? “When they wanted to recruit me as a whistleblower,” Josef Zíma recalls an unpleasant meeting with the StB.
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“They wanted to know from me, for example, how the audience reacts to Mr. Werich. I confided in him about it and asked him for help. I don’t know all the details, I just know that he was acquainted with the then Minister of the Interior, Barák, and after some intervention by him, they let me go. Moreover, they put such a fool on me that I was ashamed. After the revolution, I found out that I had been written in the internal file that I was useless because I only talked about myself.”
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The fateful year of 1959
Jan Werich also helped him after a tragic car accident in 1959, when Zíma was bedridden for a long time and sentenced to a heavy fine, because three passengers were seriously injured when they crashed into a tree.
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“He started a passbook for my daughter Zuzana, who was only a year old, to which other colleagues also contributed. It took two years before I could stand on stage again. At first, I toured vaudeville, financially it was a misery. Physically I got over it after a few months, psychologically it is still not resolved to this day. I will carry it with me for the rest of my life.”
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Tragically, his wife, actress Eva Klepáčová, also took it away. While he was in hospital, she attempted suicide by jumping out of a window, and mental problems haunted her until her death in 2012.
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Despite all the troubles, their marriage lasted over half a century. “It’s because we haven’t seen each other much,” states the jubilant with a smile. “We were both very busy, we just opened doors for each other at home, which although our little daughter suffered, but it benefited us. Husbands and wives must not take each other for granted, they must look forward to each other. We managed to do that.”
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When they met, she was sixteen, he was a year older. “I saw her by chance in a cafe where she was with another company. I liked her right away. I found out who it is. At the time, she was a guest in a girl’s role at the Vinohradský theater, I stood at the back entrance to see her. We only really met when she was doing exams at DAMU. There was a time when students co-decided on everything, their representative also sat at the admissions desks. Absolute stupidity. I happened to be sitting on the jury as a representative of the student body. I could tell her in the hallway that she was accepted. That was the first time we spoke.’
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He celebrated his 65th birthday in 1997 with a concert in Prague’s Lucerna. The first congratulator was his wife Eva Klepáčová.
Photo: CTK
They got married in 1958, soon after their daughter Zuzana was born. It is not without interest that Ms. Eva was originally supposed to play Princess Lada in The Princess with a Golden Star alongside her husband, but her pregnancy was already so obvious that Marie Kyselková took over the role.
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Daughter Zuzana initially followed in her parents’ footsteps and graduated from an acting conservatory. However, she soon got married, two daughters were born to her, and to the joy of her parents, playing was over.
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Never complain
At first, even Josef Zíma’s parents did not have much understanding for their son’s acting career. “They were both teachers when I left grammar school for the conservatory, they weren’t enthusiastic at all. They did not consider it dignified to be a ‘comedian’. Then when they saw me on radio and television, they were proud of me.”
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What was popularity like in the tight fifties? “It cannot be compared with today. On the one hand, there was no boulevard, on the other hand, at that time, any singing or acting idols were considered something harmful,” smiles Josef Zíma, adding that popularity had friendly dimensions back then.
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“People recognized me on the street or in the tram, there were girls standing at the entrance to the barracks with souvenirs, they sometimes phoned me at night out of a binge to come see them. Who doesn’t like it when people like what they do? I still have it to this day. After the performance, I sign photos for an hour. Little girls used to go, now grandmothers go.’
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The stars of that time did not live on a high footing, even in terms of materiality: “Today, an artist asks for a fee, if the organizer can accommodate him, they make an agreement. There was a strict tariff for us, we performed for as much as was determined. I had 150 crowns for the performance, what can I tell you. It’s better to keep quiet about the gags in the theater. Certainly no one could envy us money.”
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It is characteristic of Josef Zíma that he never complains. In his nineties, he does not move well, but he enjoys that his voice and memory still serve him and he can go out to meet his beloved audience.
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“I’ve been doing sports all my life,” he emphasizes. “I’m cursing it a little today, because I took off both knees in the process. I have replaced them, I would need a new one again, but I don’t want to do that anymore. They say I shouldn’t have been running, but going for intense walks. But if I hadn’t been running since I was young, maybe I wouldn’t be here.”
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He is also happy with his family, which he remains surrounded by. He lives with his daughter and son-in-law in a house on Prague’s Bílá Hora, which he built fifty years ago. In the meantime, four great-grandchildren were added to the two granddaughters. The fact that neither of them could pursue an artistic career does not bother him in the least.
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