While the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike has halted and postponed a number of large productions in the Czech Republic, smaller titles continue to shoot as planned. The second season of The Empress, a German-language Netflix series about Empress Elisabeth of Austria (Sisi), is slated to film scenes in Prague’s city center next week.
The Empress stars Devrim Lingnau as Empress Sisi, who began the first season of the series as a 16-year-old Bavarian duchess who falls in love with Franz Joseph, Emperor of Austria (Philip Froissant), who had originally intended to marry her sister (Elisa Schlott).
After marrying Franz Joseph and moving to Vienna, Sisi finds herself in the middle of political intrigue involving her aunt-turned-mother-in-law Sophia, Franz’s younger brother Archduke Maximilian (Johannes Nussbaum), Franz’s old lover (Svenja Jung), and a revolutionary posing as a countess (Almila Bagriacik). Jördis Triebel co-stars as Sisi’s mother.
The first season of The Empress primarily takes place in Vienna, but production largely took place at Babelsberg Studio in Potsdam and surrounding areas in Bavaria including Schloss Weißenstein in Pommersfelden, which stood in for Vienna’s Schönbrunn Palace.
Prague, meanwhile, may be playing itself in for scenes during the second season of The Empress. The real Empress Elisabeth of Austria visited the Czech lands with her new husband shortly after marrying in 1854, and the pair stayed in what is now Hradčany by Prague Castle.
In Prague’s city center, scenes for The Empress are slated to film in areas of Malá Strana and Hradčany from September 11-14. Locations utilized include parts of the Royal Route from Nerudova street to the Radnické schody steps up to the Castle and Ke Hradu street.
The Empress will also film by Prague Castle at Hradčanské náměstí and nearby Loretánská street, which were also used for the production of Interview with the Vampire earlier this summer.
Other locations in Prague that were visited by the real-life Sisi during her official visit and could be utilized for The Empress included Wallenstein Palace in Malá Strana and the Church of Saints Cyril and Methodius in Karlín. Sisi and Franz Joseph also traveled to Děčín Castle and Ploskovice Castle in northern Bohemia to visit Emperor Ferdinand I and his wife.
Other titles currently filming in Prague also include the long-running German-language detective series Money Murder Zurich (Der Zürich-Krimi) which has also been shooting in the city center and other locations in Prague since last month.
Interview with the Vampire, which has struck a special deal with SAG-AFTRA to continue filming amidst the ongoing actors’ strike, will head back to the Czech capital later this fall after halting filming in late July.
