14 Facts About Peter Zadek

Peter Zadek was a German director of theatre, opera and film, a translator and a screenwriter.

Peter Zadek is regarded as one of the greatest directors in German-speaking theater.

Peter Zadek was born on 19 May 1926 to a Jewish family in Berlin.

Peter Zadek began in weekly rep in Swansea and Pontypridd.

Peter Zadek studied at the Old Vic, and his first productions included Oscar Wilde's Salome and T S Eliot's Sweeney Agonistes.

Peter Zadek worked as a director for the BBC in this period.

Peter Zadek was renowned for productions of Shakespeare's plays and for sparking a greater interest in English drama among German audiences.

Peter Zadek died on 30 July 2009 in Hamburg, survived by his two children, Simon Zadek and Michele Zadek-Ewing.

Peter Zadek headed up such major German theatres as the Schauspiel Bochum, where he shaped the Zadek-Era.

From 1992 to 1996 Peter Zadek was appointed as one head among others at the Berliner Ensemble, the theater founded by Bertolt Brecht.

Peter Zadek directed his first opera, Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro, in 1983.

Peter Zadek directed Kurt Weill's Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny at the Salzburg Festival in 1998.

Peter Zadek acted in a small role in Rainer Werner Fassbinder's film Die Sehnsucht der Veronika Voss.

In giving the award to Peter Zadek, we wanted to salute the work of an artist who, in a long career beginning in England and continuing for more than forty years in Germany, has reinvented the art of the theatre director by working at the same time both directly on the text with his chosen actors, and in pursuit of a 'conceptual' method of directing.