Peter Brook’s “Battlefield”
On March 23, I was fortunate enough to be able to see Peter Brook’s Battlefield at the Stadsschouwburg Theatre in Amsterdam. The play, which is part of the larger Indian epic the Mahabharata, has the feel of folklore. A simple set, composed mostly of bamboo rods, leaves the exact locale of each scene amorphous and largely up to the imaginations of audience members. The actors often speak in narration, halfway between telling the story and living it in real time, reminiscent of stories passed down orally through the ages.
In an interview with cast member Jared McNeill after the performance, McNeill told us that Brook’s simple style of set and minimal usage of props is less minimalism and more “reducing the story to its essentials.” Much of Battlefield’s world was evoked through simple props of large pieces of fabric in primary or neutral colors, and sticks. Oria Puppo’s costume design is simple, neat, and often relies on suggestion from the same colorful fabric. In one scene it may represent the coronation of a king; in another, a death shroud. By using the bare basics of spectacle in set, costume, and props, Brook assures that there is no unnecessary distraction from the acting. The dialogue and movements have a composed rhythm to them that evokes an age-old story, but the emotional presence of each character and the actor portraying them brings this ancient epic to life on the stage.
Some audience members even got to interact with it, in a comedic moment when the Mongoose is given the King’s riches (styled as a heap of colorful scarves) and told to distribute them among the poor. The Mongoose, played by Edwin Lee Gibson, leans over the stage and asked in Dutch — the only line in the play not delivered in English — “Where are the poor people?” The people of the front row looked back and forth between each other, the Mongoose eventually just opted to hand it to the woman directly in front of him, physically breaking the fourth wall as the scarves change hands. This moment is a nod to Brecht’s principle of reminding audience members that they are watching a play, as well as Artaud’s belief in breaking down the barriers between audience and actor. Both Brecht and Artaud are known influences on Brook’s work, and Brook’s Mahabharata has been called epic theatre.
The story itself is certainly epic in proportion, taking place just after a devastating war that left many people dead on both sides. Yudhishthira has just won the war, killing his enemy Karna, who he learns is his half-brother. Distraught, he attempts to refuse the kingship, but is advised by all of his elders not to; his grandfather tells him a series of parables to convince him he must become king until he eventually agrees. These parables are inserted periodically into the text, taking the forms of both tragic myths, such as the story of Karna’s conception and birth, and playful folktales, like the worm crossing the street who stops to ponder the meaning of life.
The language is stylized, narrative in flow. The stylization is most obvious in McNeill (Yudishthira), who spoke with a raspy, nearly strained voice. All of the actors, American in background, adopted an accent, that is beautiful in sound and suited to the Sanskrit words, but unable to be placed in an exact region. This makes the tale feel almost like a fairy tale about an imaginary — or so ancient as to seem it — kingdom far away. The play is no light-hearted child’s romp, however. The play begins with Dhritarashtra proclaiming, “My son is dead.” The image of the characters somberly describing the carnage of the war draws up far more potent images in the mind’s-eye of audience members than any stage could contain.
The characters are each wrestling with their own private guilt and sorrow following the war. Yudishthira’s hard-won victory feels more like a defeat in the wake of all the lives lost, and the newly crowned king is faced with the responsibility for those deaths. He wishes to leave for the forest to fast and do penance but his dharma is to be a good king for 36 years. This notion of responsibility — Yudishthira has a responsibility to be a good king to make the war worth fighting — is one that Brook feels is relevant to today’s society. In an interview with Slant Magazine, Brook cited the atom bomb’s creator and Hiroshima, which helped end WWII but caused horrific loss of life and trauma to the Japanese people, as a historical example of defeated victory riddled by guilt and remorse and paralleled this to modern public relations over nuclear weaponry. Brook said, “‘What, now is the responsibility?’ …[is] the question we all wish our soldiers, generals, and leaders would ask.”
The themes of warfare and justice carry throughout the performance. Emotional tension is emphasized by the use of a traditional Japanese drum, played expertly by Toshi Tsuchitori, who sits in a chair onstage. The drum beat harkens back to ancient war drums and the pounding of the human heart, and it sets the tempo for the action and dialogue of each scene. The drum is so effortlessly woven into the cadence of the performance that it feels a natural, innate piece of the story.
Philippe Vialatte’s lighting design is eloquent, using simple colors and suggestive gobos to evoke setting and subtle emotion. A particularly moving moment occurs when the aging queen, Kunti (played by Karen Aldridge) leads blind Dhritarashtra (played by Larry Yando) into the fire consuming the forest, where they both perish. The fire is evoked by bright, midtone orange sidelight that floods the actors in warm light and throws long shadows reminiscent of flickering flames. From the audience perspective, the elders disappear into that light.
The play is staged with no intermission; there is no break in the flow of the performance. Storylines are fluid and cross each other, and sometimes many years pass at a time. At the very end of the play, all of the characters who have died return to the stage, so that all four actors are present onstage for the final moments. One by one they each notice Tsuchitori and his drum as if for the first time as the drum beat reaches a crescendo and fades away. Several moments of silence pass before, slowly, the house lights begin to come up. The actors remain frozen in position until the house lights are fully on, and then they take their bows. In this way, the play doesn’t so much end as the audience stops being able to see it, very fitting for a piece taken from an immense epic.
The resulting piece of theatre is beautiful and moving to watch. Brook’s use of curated simplicity allows the epic to reach its mythic proportions in the imagination of the audience despite its small cast and uncomplicated design. It is a brilliant example of Brook’s aim to tell a moving story without all the “distractions” of intense special effects, sets, costumes, and props. I think this approach has worked wonderfully for Battlefield, but as a props maker I can’t deny that I’m rather partial to those “distractions.”
