Peter Brook, one of the most creative and controversial stage directors of post-war Britain, has died aged 97, reports BBC News.
Born in London, his stage productions, starring some of theatre's most distinguished thespians, both enthralled and shocked audiences.
His career took in Shakespeare plays, Broadway musicals and cinema, including an adaptation of Lord of the Flies.
Brook, who had lived in France since 1974, died in Paris on Saturday, according to reports.
Peter Stephen Paul Brook was born in west London in March 1925, the son of Jewish immigrants.
He did not have a theatrical background, but after studying at Oxford University his talent was quickly spotted.
By his mid-20s he had a reputation as the grand old enfant terrible of the British stage.
Over the ensuing decades Brook put his stamp on the theatre, breaking many established conventions.
At the age of 20 he was appointed director of Birmingham Repertory Theatre.
He soon moved on to the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) and then to the Royal Opera House where, as director of productions in the late 1940s, his work included La Boheme and Salome.
Brook was subsequently director at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York.
He later told the BBC that he regarded British post-war theatre as having become "old-fashioned, stereotyped and in the hands of a small number of very conventional people who did Shakespeare in the most boring way imaginable".
Read more of this report from BBC News.
See also this obituary of Peter Brook published in The Times.