Chris Brookes, a founding pillar of theatre in Newfoundland and Labrador, author, broadcaster and storyteller known around the world for his audio documentaries, has died.

Brookes’s professional work took him around the world, beginning engineering studies at Memorial University before pursuing theatre at Yale University and the University of Michigan.

He made radio documentaries as early as the 1990s, which included work with the CBC in Newfoundland and Labrador, and did much of his later work at Battery Radio — an independent company that creates broadcast documentaries and sound design.

He was known for his storytelling ability and creativity, being a key part of several recent podcasting projects around St. John’s. He received the Order of Canada for his contributions to Newfoundland culture in 2000, and an honourary doctorate from Memorial in 2007.

Recently, Brookes helped to create The Other Side of This, an audio treasure hunt of shorts that brings people through downtown St. John’s, and Consent, a podcast app that guided listeners through the grey areas of consent and featured pieces from the sexual assault trial of RNC officer Doug Snelgrove.

St. John’s actor Andy Jones worked with Brookes over the last few years to produce the audio version of the children’s books he wrote, and says they were some of the best times of his career.

“He is a major figure in that world in terms of passing on the stories of Newfoundland,” Jones told CBC News Tuesday.

“He was one of a kind, really I think, in many ways. In his approach to storytelling and his approach to radio and broadcasting in general. I mean the biggest thing that we’re gonna miss is Chris Brookes, you know? He just did so much, and was such a powerful and influential presence in the arts here.”

He really believed that theatre was the means by which those stories could be told.– Donna Butt

Brookes was also a founding member of The Mummers Troupe, known across the province and the country for their plays performed in the 1970s and early ’80s.

Many of the works were community-based and controversial, such as What’s That Got To Do With The Price of Fish? and They Club Seals Don’t They? 

The Troupe also founded the Resource Centre for the Arts in St. John’s, helping to purchase, renovate and develop the LSPU Hall in St. John’s as a marquee local performance space.

Donna Butt, the artistic executive director of Rising Tide Theatre in Trinity, was hired by Brookes in 1973 and worked with the group on many productions. She says she wouldn’t be in the industry without Brookes.

“We kind of saw ourselves as giving a voice to our own stories. And that was, you know, very much what Chris wanted to do … [He] pulled us, many of us, into his orbit. And in some cases we’ve carried on ever since,” Butt said.

“Chris brought that vision and that, that desire. He really believed that theatre was the means by which those stories could be told. And I think he was right. Very right.”

Brookes’s work as a mummer had a profound effect on community theatre producer and director Fabian O’Keefe, who saw the Troupe burst into his classroom as a teenager.

“It was awesome. It was magical. It was awesome as in it filled me with awe,” O’Keefe said Tuesday.

“He had a profound effect on me as a child. Gave me a different view of the performing arts, and one that has shaped my approach to work for the last, well, 40 years.”

O’Keefe and Brookes would become good friends, he said, and remembers Brookes as a thoughtful, curious soul who had time for everyone and everything.

“He just had a real sense of fun and adventure. And what have we lost? It’s immeasurable,” he said.

“I mean, how do you measure something that gigantic?”

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