John Peter
The Sunday Times’ authoritative and respected chief drama critic and founder of the Ian Charleson Awards for young actors
As a theatre critic for the Sunday Times from 1967 to 2010, John Peter was an authoritative, respected and – when he considered it necessary – provocative commentator, who also founded the Ian Charleson Awards for young actors.
His pointed reviews won him admirers as well as detractors – among his critics were Steven Berkoff, who accused him of “mental fatigue,” and Mark Rylance, who tried to ban him from Shakespeare’s Globe during his tenure as artistic director.
Born in Budapest, Hungary, Peter’s father was an eminent art historian executed by Nazi sympathisers and his mother was a former actor. His interest in theatre was sparked by seeing Richard III in Budapest in 1955 on the eve of the popular uprising against communist control. It proved a Damascene moment.
He and his mother escaped the communist backlash against the 1956 uprising – as well as his alcoholic stepfather – arriving inEngland with the help of the Red Cross. Teaching himself English, he secured a place at the University of Oxford (paid for by working in the refectory kitchen), where he began reviewing for student newspapers such as Cherwell and wrote his dissertation on Elizabethan and Jacobean drama.
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In 1964, the critic Sheridan Morley invited Peter to contribute to the Times Educational Supplement, where he also worked as an editorial assistant and began reviewing for the Times. He joined the Sunday Times in 1967, becoming assistant arts editor in 1979.
He was appointed chief drama critic in 1984, holding the post until 2003, when Theatregoer magazine profiled him and 10 other critics as “the most powerful people in theatre”. He continued to review for the paper until 2010.
In 1990, Peter enlisted the Sunday Times and the National Theatre to create an award for young actors under 30 in memory of Ian Charleson, who had died of AIDS the same year.
He continued to lead it until 2017, and award recipients have included Paapa Essiedu, Dominic West, Emma Fielding, Tom Hollander and Ruth Negga.
Peter published Vladimir’s Carrot: Modern Drama and the Modern Imagination in 1987 and a memoir, How I Became an Englishman, is due later this year.
John Anthony Peter was born Janos Antal Peter on August 24, 1938 and died on July 3, aged 81. He is survived by his second wife, the playwright and novelist Judith Burnley.
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