Tony and Emmy award winning director Peter Brook died in Paris on Saturday, July 2. He was 97.
His career spanned eight decades and included opera, plays and film and TV productions. In October 1953, he directed a live CBS Omnibus production of King Lear starring Orson Welles in the title role and Brook’s wife, Natasha Parry, as Cordelia.
Brook and Parry were close friends of Welles and his third wife, Paola Mori.
Born in 1925, did not have a theatrical background, but after studying at Oxford University — he entered the school when he was 16 years old — he was appointed director of Birmingham Repertory Theatre when he was 20.
He was best known for his avant-garde work with the Royal Shakespeare Company throughout the 20th century. One of his most famous adaptations was his 1970 production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which saw performers on stilts and trapezes acting in a white cube.
During his career, the British-born Brook directed some of theater’s greatest performers, including Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud and Paul Scofield.
Brook was awarded Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1965 and Commandeur de la Légion d’honneur in France in 2013, in 2013.
His son, Simon, tweeted, “My dad #PeterBrook passed away last night. I am the luckiest guy in the world to have had such an amazing and loving father. May he rest in peace.”
Below is a CBS preview of King Lear with Peter Brook and host Alistair Cooke. It can also be found at youtu.be/aHQvZhOzKnw
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