The prayers of Peter Brook

The Guardian: "Peter Brook looks straight through you. As he holds out his hand to greet you, you can almost feel the ­actors whose hopes ­foundered as his pale blue eyes took the temperature of their souls. To see the great man, you must cross the stage of the former Paris ­musical hall Brook calls his mosque, and climb up a narrow, twisting ­staircase to a kind of platform where the most influential theatre director of the past 60 years spends his days, perched like a Himalayan holy man, a futon in the corner, above the railway lines of the Gare du Nord, scene of some of the most baleful comings and goings of the last century, from the trenches to the camps."