25TH BIRTHDAY I WAS THERE!
Peter Brook brings his nine- hour epic, The Mahabharata, to the Tramway, 13 Apr 1988. By theatre critic Steve Cramer
Peter Brook had proved prescient in the selection of Tramway as the venue for The Mahabharata, but in doing so, had set a challenge for out-of- town audience members, such as myself, in finding a venue that had never been used for theatre until that point. The anxiety that, never having been to Glasgow’s Southside, let alone the venue, myself and my companion wouldn’t find our way to it through the dreich Glasgow weather was overwhelming. Brook’s epic of war, human suffering and enlightenment made the journey more than worthwhile, and put Tramway at the centre of theatrical innovation for years to come. What most impressed about the sprawling nine-hour epic was that so much of it, while addressing vast political and existential issues, operated on an intimate human scale. The Mahabharata amounted to both parable and theatre, opening to its audiences a largely unfamiliar parallel form of Bible story from an equally holy text. The sensation of being exposed to a profound piece of knowledge, which had until then been shrouded behind the label ‘exotic’, was reinforced again and again. What I remember feeling at the time was not the question of why the story was being told, but why hadn’t it been told long before.
‘Peter Brook had set a
challenge for out-of-town audience members such as myself.’
23 Sep–7 Oct 2010 THE LIST 21
CHRIS HANNAN: ELIZABETH GORDON QUINN Opened 27 June, 1985
‘In part it was the directors saying, “We want to put on big epic plays.” They put on Elizabeth Gordon Quinn in a broader European context – the manner of the production was Brechtian. I was looking to models like Georg Kaiser and German expressionism and taking Scottish tradition – tenements and all that – and trying to see it in a bigger context.
‘What I was aware of was these really good actors being around: Ken Stott, Tilda Swinton, Kate Duchêne. There were all the European plays going on, so there was a bigger picture than just us three. What was confidence-building was that we fitted in with these other plays. We had a Scottish angle on a European tradition. ‘Since then, things have got better for playwrights – they’re paid better, writers such as David Greig, David Harrower and Gregory Burke are much more confident about their place in Europe, and also we no longer have the idea that a new play could not be put on in any of the big theatres in Scotland. That has changed radically and it feels permanent. We have been lucky in that we are, by and large, going to be the first generation of Scottish playwrights to have a full career – a youth, a middle age and even an old age.’
JO CLIFFORD: LOSING VENICE Opened 1 August, 1985
‘I’m amazed at the risk the Traverse took. Not only did they schedule the play before I’d written it, but they scheduled it to be in the festival in their main house. It was the hugest act of trust in me. I remember sitting in rehearsals feeling totally terrified because the actors were having a lot of difficulty with the script, not because it was a bad script (which is what I assumed), but because it demanded they perform in a way
that was different. Even when it was a huge success and people were queueing all the way down the stairs of the old Traverse for returns, I couldn’t quite believe it. ‘There was an incredible air of activity and so much creative energy in the building. I feel very proud of what we all
achieved. It put Scotland on the map. You can see the legacy of it today in the National Theatre of Scotland, the massive international success of Black Watch and now, when there is a hit, the structures are in place for it to go abroad and get the kind of exposure it needs to establish itself in the repertoire.’