This week after the portfolio chaos was over we talked about The Empty Space by Peter Brook and focused on the Deadly Theatre portion. I thought it was interesting for Brook to begin with the bad which I justified by the fact that perhaps he thinks there is too much deadly theatre going on. We had a class discussion and each contributed one significant line or aspect of the section. I spoke about "the deadly spectator" which is the idea that the audience can make the actors perform worse. Overall, it was really helpful and interesting to have a discussion where everyone contributed to the group ideas.
One of the things I noticed with this book was that there were a lot of references to particular theatre performances, some of which I didn't know. It got me thinking and I realized that this book had a purpose to target artists who have already been working in and have studied theatre, not those who haven not been exposed to theatre. It seems Brook is trying to convince his audience to change their previous views.
"I realized that this book had a purpose to target artists who have already been working in and have studied theatre, not those who haven not been exposed to theatre."
ReplyDeleteThis is a brilliant observation that I never caught: Brook is writing for the pro's, isn't he? For the do-ers, not for the casual reader. This is really crucial - it completely reframes the book for me.