British theater, film director Peter Brook dies at age 97

The British theatre directer known for his famous adaption of the Mahabharata died on Saturday

“I can take any empty space and call it a bare stage. A man walks across this empty space whilst someone else is watching him, and this is all that is needed for an act of theatre to be engaged.”

So begins The Empty Space (1968) by the British theatre director Peter Brook, who died on Saturday, aged 97. He was famous for his adaptation of the Mahabharata.

Brook’s goal, as he put it, was to work “outside of contexts”, asking: “In what conditions is it possible for what happens in a theatre experience to originate from a group of actors and be received and shared by spectators without the help and hindrance of […] shared cultural signs and tokens?”

In 1979, Brook took his international troupe on a trip through Africa, presenting The Conference of the Birds, a play based on a 12th Century Persian poem, to audiences with whom they expected to have nothing in common.

This phase of what came to be called intercultural theatre culminated in a famous adaptation of The Mahabharata.

Premiering at the Avignon festival in 1985 with a cast drawn from many cultures and theatrical traditions, the drama was praised by critics for its beauty and limpid theatricality of the production. However, it also triggered a critical backlash.

As Australians well know, there are no “empty spaces” that are simply there for the taking. There are no cultural forms that exist “outside of contexts”.