BIO
A native of Trinidad in the West Indies, L. Peter Callender has worked professionally as an actor for over thirty years, and more recently as a director and writer. He received his formal training in the theater at the Juilliard School in New York City; Webber/Douglas Academy in London, England; Mask Technique with Julie Taymor; and The Suzuki Technique with The Tadashi Suzuki Company in Toga-mura, Japan. He has appeared on Broadway, off-Broadway, in regional theaters across the US, and has performed internationally in Japan, England, and France.
His New York credits include: Tom/Jamaican Waiter in Prelude to a Kiss (Circle Rep. and at the Helen Hayes Theater on Broadway, directed by Norman René); Off-Broadway: Roscoe in The Caucasian Chalk Circle (at the Public Theater, directed by George C. Wolfe); Caliban in The Tempest (at Classic Stage Company, directed by Julie Taymor); Curio/Ensemble in Twelfth Night (at the Delacorte Theater, directed by Harold Guskin).
Mr. Callender was an Associate Artist at the California Shakespeare Theater for nearly 20 years. Some favorites roles at CalShakes include: the title roles in Julius Caesar and Cymbeline; Oberon in Midsummer Night's Dream; Capulet in Romeo and Juliet; Orsino in Twelfth Night; Leonato in Much Ado About Nothing; Polixenes and Leontes in Winter's Tale; Navarre in Love's Labor's Lost; Bolingbroke in Richard II; Duke Solinus in Comedy of Errors; Laertes in Hamlet; Dukes Frederick and Senior in As You Like It; La Feu in All's Well That Ends Well; Dr Chasuable in The Importance of Being Earnest; Vincent Crummels in Nicholas Nickleby; Roebuck Ramsden in Man and Superman; and Colonel Pickering in Pygmalion.
Since 2009, Mr. Callender has served as Artistic Director of the African-American Theater Company--proud recipient of the Paine Knickerbocker Paine Award for continued contribution to Bay Area Theater.
Mr. Callender has been a visiting professor at Stanford University teaching Acting Shakespeare.
The Whipping Man
My Children! My Africa!
Driving Miss Daisy
Spunk
Permanent Collection