Interview with Peter Whitehead

The interviewer and source of the following interview are unknown; taken from the Nohzone Archives.

Why did you choose to film Peter Brook's play?

I didn't intend to make a film about the Vietnam War, but to address the problem of the artist confronting the notion of "engagement." It seems to me to be easy to denounce—either through film or theater—atrocities committed in the name of the war, all the more so since Britain isn't directly involved in the conflict. So I was concerned that if I accepted Brook's invitation to film US I'd become a follower of the current fashion, and thereby take the easy way out. More than anything I was afraid that my resolution would fade when faced with the importance of Vietnam.

Did Brook share your position on this issue?

When I started filming, I was worried that he wasn't aware of it. I was actually interested in his work as a theater director. It was while I was shooting the first scenes of the film, covering the public debates with Brook and his actors, which took place after the staging of US in London, that I began to understand that Brook's concerns, to a certain extent, were similar to mine.

What exactly were your concerns?

Of course it's difficult to define them precisely in a single sentence, but they can be understood at a variety of levels. For example, in the United States, a department store has increased its sales to a considerable extent by selling dresses with Anti-Vietnam War slogans. American women are rushing to buy them and for five dollars are appeasing their conscience.

Don't laugh! It's just like when you've taken part in a heated political discussion with your friends, when you've bought your "protest paper" in the morning, when you've enthusiastically applauded a film or a play dealing with the war in Vietnam. And all the more so when your country is not a part of the conflict. All this is situated at the level of the "consumer." But consider the moral problems which face the artist, the creator of "the object which appeases the conscience."

So you don't believe in revolutionary cinema?

Certainly not. A director may, and must, have a political conscience, but it would be absurd for him to believe—and dishonest for him to want others to believe—that he is committing a revolutionary act when being creative. When you have chosen to be a revolutionary, you are not a director. You are Che Guevara.

So you're happy working in fiction?

Fiction is indispensable to all artistic creation, but real creative acts must necessarily be rooted in reality. The "probable" is often stronger than immediate reality. Benefit of the Doubt, which is a product of Brook's imagination, starts from the reality of London, which becomes, in my film, the vital complement to the fictional starting-point.

How much importance do you attach to editing?

I am my own cameraman, and therefore have many problems with the editing of my films. In fact, when shooting I have already chosen what I believe to be the most important visual elements. This also applies to the length, rhythm, and angle of the shots. I'm always afraid of distorting the reality which I have captured at the moment of shooting, and am more willing to retain certain long shots than cut them and risk altering the original atmosphere.

Who are your favourite directors?

Jean-Luc Godard, Ingmar Bergman, Federico Fellini, Skolimowski.

And American cinema?

It was always too close to me. It represented a culture which surrounded and stifled me. In an act of great unfairness, I rejected it as a whole and for a long time refused to go see American films. It was only when I made some films of a very different character that I began to rediscover their greatness, and also because I went to the United States and realized that what I had taken for an inferior product was very often a reflection of American reality. [End...