Peter Brook's Mahabharata

Peter Brook’s nine-hour epic, The Mahabharata, inaugurated the BAM Majestic Theater (now called the Harvey Theater). The Majestic had been designed according to Brook’s specifications because, according to Chloe Obolensky, a stage designer who worked on Mahabharata, the space reminded him of his Paris theater, Les Bouffes du Nord. Brook’s design for the Majestic—which had sat abandoned for two decades before BAM’s acquisition—left it in “a state of studied ruin,” as the New York Times put it. The Mahabharata is now considered one of Brook’s crowning directorial achievements, and it stands as one of the most successful productions of the Next Wave Festival.