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• Born: 8 September 1925
• Birthplace: Southsea, Hampshire, England
• Died: 24 July 1980 (heart attack)
• Best Known As: Inspector Clouseau in the Pink Panther comedies

A chameleon of an actor, Sellers played Inspector Clouseau, the bumbling Paris police detective in the long-running Pink Panther film series. Sellers played the character in six films, ranging from The Pink Panther (1964) to Trail of the Pink Panther (1982, assembled from old footage after his death). Sellers was a Royal Air Force entertainer during World War II, then gained public fame on The Goon Show, a Monty Pythonesque radio comedy revue of the 1950s. His film career blossomed in 1964, when he played three roles in the dark 1964 comedy Dr. Strangelove, directed by Stanley Kubrick and co-starring George C. Scott. (Sellers was meek President Merklin Muffley, stiff British Group Captain Lionel Mandrake, and ex-Nazi genius Dr. Strangelove.) Multiple roles became a Sellers signature; he played two or more characters in Lolita (1962), The Prisoner of Zenda (1979) and other films. His penultimate role, as Chance, the gently befuddled gardener in the 1979 film Being There (with Shirley MacLaine), included a famous line about TV: "I like to watch." Despite his long acting career, Sellers never won an Academy Award. He was nominated for acting twice: for Dr. Strangelove and for Being There.

Sellers was also Oscar-nominated as co-director of the slapstick short subject The Running, Jumping and Standing Still Film (1959); he lost to Histoire d'un Poisson Rouge (Story of a Red Fish), produced by Jacques Cousteau... According to the official website of Sellers's estate, "Sellers married four times, to Anne Howe (Sept. 15, 1951), Britt Ekland (Feb. 19, 1964), Miranda Quarry (Aug. 24, 1970) and Lynne Frederick (Feb. 18, 1977). He also sired three children: Michael (April 2, 1954), Sarah (Oct. 16, 1957) and Victoria (Jan. 20, 1965)"... The original Pink Panther film spawned a related animated character, also called The Pink Panther.

• Genre: Comedy
• Active: '50s, '60s, '70s
• Instrument: Vocals, Arranger, Keyboards

Biography

On an international level, Peter Sellers is most famous as a screen comedian, starring in Dr. Strangelove, The Pink Panther, Being There, and other films. Actually, he was an all-around performer who was a household name in England long before Dr. Strangelove made him a big star overseas. Although his film career was well underway by the end of the 1950s, he first rose to prominence as a radio performer on The Goon Show (collaborating with other comedians, especially Harry Secombe and Spike Milligan). His radio success almost immediately led to solo comedy recordings (many of the Goon Show broadcasts were eventually issued on record as well, especially on the BBC's own label).

Sellers' most active period as a recording artist was the late '50s and early '60s. These albums and singles represent a central foundation of British comedy, and a source for many of the ideas and approaches that were expounded upon in later years by Monty Python, the Bonzo Dog Band, and others. The unsurpassed master of accents, Sellers mimicked -- to accurate and hilarious effect -- all British classes (and regions), as well as a good many foreign tones. His sketches contain many of the situations that are taken for granted as staples of British comedy -- satires of stuffy BBC interviews, screeching frumpy women, Cockney bastards, and droll portraits of political crackpots. Like the best of Monty Python, the best of Sellers' work has proven surprisingly timeless -- the silliness is so droll, sophisticated, and brilliantly executed that the humor has dated barely or not at all.

Sellers often employed musical satire, and these again were prototypes for the sort of wackiness displayed by Monty Python, the Bonzos, and more specific send-ups like the Rutles and Spinal Tap. His early rock & roll, swing jazz, skiffle, and folk satires still rate among the best ever done. Although some topical references have dated these slightly, they remain basically hilarious. You don't need to be a pop scholar to appreciate the boozy anarchy of his Irish folk satire, or the overstuffed egos of the overnight rock & roll sensations he imitates. In the early '60s, he even had a couple of British hit singles via musical duets with Sophia Loren.

Sellers' early albums and singles were produced by George Martin, who was still several years away from meeting the Beatles when he began to work with the comedian. With their overlapping dialogue and sound effects, Sellers' sketches required (by the standards of the time) considerable production sophistication and ingenuity. Martin's experience with Sellers no doubt came in handy when the Beatles' arrangements and production techniques became increasingly sophisticated in the later part of the 1960s. In fact, one of the reasons that the Beatles and Martin hit it off so well from their very first meeting was that the Fab Four were big Goon Show fans, and consequently very impressed by Martin's credentials. Sellers, for his part, paid the Beatles back by recording some affectionate spoken-word parodies of Lennon-McCartney classics in the mid-'60s (produced, like the original versions, by Martin). One of these, a Shakespearean reading of "A Hard Day's Night," actually made the British Top 20 in the mid-'60s. Sellers became friendly with the Beatles themselves, resulting in Ringo Starr's co-starring role with Peter in the 1969 movie The Magic Christian.

Sellers' activities in recording studios began to decline during the mid-'60s, when filming commitments took up the bulk of his time. He did continue to record sporadically right up until his death in 1980, as both a solo artist and a guest, making unexpected cameos on records by the Hollies and Steeleye Span. His best records were very hard to come by in North America, but that situation was rectified in 1993 with the release of EMI's A Celebration of Sellers box set. ~ Richie Unterberger, All Music Guide

A Celebration of Sellers Buy this CD

• Born: Sep 08, 1925 in Southsea, England, UK
• Died: Jul 24, 1980
• Occupation: Actor, Writer, Director, Cinematographer
• Active: '50s-'70s
• Major Genres: Comedy
• Career Highlights: The Ladykillers, Being There, I Love You, Alice B. Toklas
• First Major Screen Credit: The Ladykillers (1955)

Biography

One of the greatest comic talents of his generation, Peter Sellers had an exceptional gift for losing himself in a character -- so much so that, beyond his remarkable skill as a performer and his fondness for the humor of the absurd, it's difficult to draw a connection between many of his best performances. While his fondness for playing multiple roles in the same film may have seemed like a stunt coming from many other actors, Sellers had the ability to make each character he played seem distinct and different, and while he was known and loved as a funnyman, only in a handful of roles was he able to explore the full range of his gifts, which suggested he could have had just as strong a career as a dramatic actor.

Born Richard Henry Sellers on September 8, 1925, Sellers was nicknamed "Peter" by his parents, Bill and Agnes Sellers, in memory of his brother, who was a stillbirth. Bill and Agnes made their living as performers on the British vaudeville circuit, and Sellers made his first appearance on-stage only two days after his birth, when his father brought out his infant son during an encore. As a child, Sellers studied dance at the behest of his parents when not occupied with his studies at St. Aloysius' Boarding and Day School for Boys. Sellers also developed a knack for music, and in his teens began playing drums with local dance bands. Shortly after his 18th birthday, Sellers joined the Royal Air Force, and became part of a troupe of entertainers who performed at RAF camps both in England and abroad. During his time in the service, Sellers met fellow comedians Spike Milligan, Harry Secombe, and Michael Bentine; after the war, they found work as performers with the British Broadcasting Corporation, and Sellers hoped to follow suit. After several failed auditions, Sellers struck upon the idea of calling Roy Speer, a BBC producer, posing as one of the network's top actors. Sellers gave Sellers an enthusiastic recommendation, and Speer gave him a spot on the radio series Show Time.

After he signed on with the BBC, Sellers became reacquainted with Milligan, Secombe, and Bentine, and together they comprised the cast of The Goon Show, which upon its debut in 1949 became one of Great Britain's most popular radio shows; the absurd and often surreal humor of the Goons would prove to be the first glimmer of the British Comedy Movement of the '60s and '70s, paving the way for Beyond the Fringe and Monty Python's Flying Circus. The Goon Show provided Sellers with his entry into film acting, as he appeared in several short comedies alongside Milligan and Secombe, as well as the feature film Down Among the Z Men (aka The Goon Movie). Sellers also married for the first time during the height of Goon-mania, wedding Anne Howe in the fall of 1951. Sellers won his first significant non-Goon screen role in 1955, with the classic Alec Guinness comedy The Ladykillers, but his first international hit would have to wait until 1958, when he appeared in George Pal's big-budget musical Tom Thumb. In 1959, Sellers appeared in the satiric comedy I'm All Right, Jack, which earned him Best Actor honors from the British Film Academy; the same year, Sellers enjoyed a major international success with The Mouse That Roared, in which he played three different roles (one of them a woman). While a bona-fide international comedy star, Sellers had a hard time finding roles that made the most of his talents, and it wasn't until after a handful of unremarkable features that he received a pair of roles that allowed him to truly shine. In 1961, Sellers starred as an Indian physician in The Millionairess opposite Sophia Loren, based on a play by George Bernard Shaw (Sellers and Loren would also record a comic song together, "Goodness Gracious Me," which was a hit single in Britain), and a year later Stanley Kubrick cast him as Claire Quilty in his controversial adaptation of Vladimir Nabokov's novel Lolita.

1964 would prove to be a very big year for Peter Sellers; he would marry actress Britt Ekland in February of that year (his marriage to Anne Howe ended in divorce in 1961), and he starred in four of his most memorable films: Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, which reunited him with Stanley Kubrick and gave him star turns in three different roles; The World of Henry Orient, a comedy which won a small but devoted cult following; The Pink Panther, in which Sellers gave his first performance as the bumbling French detective Inspector Clouseau, and that film's first sequel, A Shot in the Dark. Sellers, who was described by many who knew him as a workaholic, maintained a busy schedule over the next ten years, but while the quality of his own work was consistently strong, many of the films he appeared in were sadly undistinguished, with a handful of exceptions, among them I Love You, Alice B. Toklas, The Wrong Box, and The Optimists. Sellers' appeal at the box office began to wane, and his love life took a beating as well -- he divorced Britt Ekland in 1968 and married Miranda Quarry in 1969, only to see that marriage end in 1971. But Sellers made a striking comeback in 1974 with The Return of the Pink Panther, in which he revisited his role as Inspector Clouseau. The film was a massive international hit, and Sellers would play Clouseau two more times, in The Pink Panther Strikes Again and The Revenge of the Pink Panther, though he became critical of the formulaic material in the films and would begin writing a script for a sixth Pink Panther film without the input of Blake Edwards, who had written and directed the other films in the series.

In 1977, Sellers took his fourth wife, actress Lynne Frederick, and he managed to rack up a few moderate box-office successes outside the Pink Panther series with Murder by Death and The Prisoner of Zenda. But in 1979, Sellers gave perhaps his greatest performance ever as Chance, a simpleton gardener whose babblings about plants are seen as deep metaphors by those around them, in a screen adaptation of Jerzy Kozinski's novel Being There -- a project Sellers had spent the better part of a decade trying to bring to the screen. The film won Sellers a Golden Globe award and a National Board of Review citation as Best Actor, while he also received an Academy Award nomination in the same category. While Being There seemed to point to better and more ambitious roles for Sellers, fate had other plans; the actor, who had a long history of heart trouble, died of a heart attack on July 24, 1980, not long after completing The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu, a disastrous comedy whose direction was taken over by Sellers midway through the shoot (though the original director received sole credit). Two years after his death, Peter Sellers would return to the screen in a final Pink Panther adventure, The Trail of the Pink Panther, which Blake Edwards assembled from outtakes and discarded scenes shot for the previous installments in the series. ~ All Movie Guide

Muppet Treasures Buy this Movie	The Trail of the Pink Panther Buy this Movie	The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu Buy this Movie	Being There Buy this Movie
The Prisoner of Zenda Buy this Movie	The Revenge of the Pink Panther Buy this Movie	Murder by Death Buy this Movie	The Pink Panther Strikes Again Buy this Movie

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Peter Richard Henry Sellers (1925-1980) was a British comedy genius of theater, radio, television, and movies.

Peter Sellers was born in Southsea, Hampshire, in southern England, where by chance his parents were performing in a local vaudeville show, on September 8, 1925. His father was William Sellers, a pianist and musical director, and his mother was Agnes Marks, a character actress. Sellers was ethnically half-Jewish from his mother's side, but was not religious. He was educated in a Catholic school (St. Aloysius College, Highgate, London) and his funeral service in 1980 was Anglican.

Sellers loved his mother and the show business family around him, which included his eight uncles (stage producers) and his maternal grandmother (renowned for bringing swimmers in a glass tank to the music hall stage, among other things). Peter made his stage debut at the age of five in his grandmother's review, Splash Me! His early life was filled with music hall goings-on, backstage gossip, his parents' search for "digs" (provincial lodgings suitable for entertainers), and theatrical odd jobs for himself - "head sweeperouter" in the auditorium, for instance.

Peter, a weak student at St. Aloysius, decided to become a drummer, and he secured a job with a dance band. World War II found him, at the age of 18 in 1943, with the Royal Air Force (RAF). He joined ENSA (the forces entertainment company) and served in Burma, India, and the Middle East in camp comedy shows, later touring with the RAF "Gang Show." Sellers enjoyed his time with ENSA entertaining troops. In 1946 he was demobilized; he said it was "like coming out of the sunshine into the shade."

The two "demob" years (1946-1948) were, in fact, doldrums for Sellers. He went the exhausting round of visits to dispirited theatrical agent, he got the seasonal job of entertainment director of a holiday camp, and he played the ukelele in comic skits at clubs. Finally, with an audition at the famous Windmill Theatre in London in 1948, his career made a turn, albeit his act was scheduled between nude performances. He began to make a name for himself in variety shows, appearing at the London Palladium. Sellers telephoned a BBC producer, effectively mimicking two radio stars, Richard Murdoch and Kenneth Horne, as if they were recommending him for a job. The producer gave Sellers his first radio spot. Radio was a successful field for him, with his uncanny mimicry of voices.

In January 1952 Sellars, Spike Milligan, and Harry Secombe launched the Goon Show on BBC radio, an irreverent, impious show where the Goons jested in dozens of voices of imaginary characters - which Goon was which voice, no one cared. The Goon Show took the British nation by storm; it was a hit for nine years. Tapes of episodes of the Goon Show were still being sold worldwide almost 40 years later. On British television Spike Milligan and Peter Sellers later produced their satires: A Show Called Fred, Son of Fred and Yes, It's the Cathode Ray Tube Show.

The motion picture debut for Peter Sellers (after a number of small films, like Down Among the Z Men) was a small part in The Ladykillers (1956), starring Alec Guiness. More films came in 1957 to 1959 including Carlton-Browne of the F. O. starring Terry-Thomas (1959, titled in America Man in a Cocked Hat). This was the first movie Sellers made with the production and direction team of John and Ray Boulting. Sellers signed a five-year contract with the Boultings, but with two films in 1959, The Mouse That Roared and I'm All Right, Jack, he established his movie career. In the former he played the multiple parts of a prime minister, a duchess, and a constable in a mythical, debt-ridden European nation that decides to declare war on the United States, to be later rehabilitated (like Germany and Japan) by the Americans. In the latter film he played a self-important shop steward in a British postwar factory, pitting his cunning against management. Both movies were instant hits.

The World of Henry Orient (1964) was the first "American" movie that Sellers made and was the official U.S. entry in the Cannes Film Festival. He played a vain and lecherous pianist being chased by two teenagers. But his visit to Hollywood was cut short: he had divorced his first wife, Anne Howe, and married 19-year old Britt Ekland, a rising Swedish film star, in February 1964; and he had the first of his heart attacks in April at the age of 38.

In England the first of his Pink Panther films was opening to enthused crowds while he recuperated. As inspector Clouseau, Peter Sellers gained his biggest audience. He played the Inspector as an imperturbable Gallic blunderer, a detective who could detect without knowing what he had done. The sequel, A Shot in the Dark, was released in the same year. Subsequent Pink Panther films were Return of the Pink Panther (1975) and two movies which exceeded $100 million each in revenues, The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976) and the Revenge of the Pink Panther (1978).

In contrast, also released in 1964 was the satiric film Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, in which Sellers played three parts: the mad scientist, Dr. Strangelove; the U.S. President Muffley; and RAF Group-Captain Mandrake. The 1960's were a busy time for Sellers. During this time he also made What's New, Pussy Cat? He played Fritz Fassbender, a psychiatrist with psychotic problems; it was a pure farce.

During his life, Sellers was featured in 52 movies: some were mediocre and some were a financial failure. Being There (1979) was the finest film he ever made, and he knew it. The movie, based on the novel and script by Jerzy Kosinski, concerned a strange case of mistaken identity in which a passive, harmless, and not-so-simple-minded gardener ("Chance" or Chauncey Gardiner) hooked on television was believed by the people around him to be an economic genius and oracle. Sellers (as Chance) becomes an adviser to the U.S. President, and in line for the presidency himself. Wry, understated humor marked Seller's performance in this film, in contrast with the farcical Pink Panther movies and the zany Goon Show. Without eccentric accents, multiple characters (he plays only Chance), and buffoonery, Sellers masterfully portrayed a man made illustrious by what other people detected in him, whether it was true or not.

In The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu (1980) he was co-author and director of the movie and played Dr. Fu Manchu. He gave himself, as Dr. Fu Manchu, a significant line:

-"I suppose you think I'm too old for a young, ravishing creature like yourself?"-"How old are you?"-"One hundred and sixty eight."-"You know, I don't think age matters, really."

Peter Sellers was married four times: to Anne Howe (1951-1964), an English actress with whom he had two children, Michael and Sarah; to Britt Ekland (1964-1969), a Swedish actress with whom he had a daughter, Victoria; to Miranda Quarry (1970-1974), a stepdaughter of an English peer; and to Lynne Frederick, an actress whom he married in 1977 (She turned 26 the day after Sellers died). He fell in and out of love with unexpected impetus: he surprised even himself. Sellers himself said: I seem to marry young people. I never grew up, you see - I'm still the same idiot I was at 18 or 20." This frankness about himself was there in 1960 when he painted himself as being a man of a thousand voices: "As far as I am aware I have no personality of my own whatsoever." He was very superstitious about everything, especially about his acting: "I have the feeling that the film character enters my body as if I were a kind of medium. It's a little frightening." For all the hype of an interview with a film star, he may have been telling the truth.

Apparently by temperament and personality he was a fit subject, predisposed to heart problems; he was demanding in the theater (he hated "hamming" and amateurism). He was given to temper tantrums and was restless and quixotic by nature, and he could not stand pettyminded bureaucrats, officers, landladies, and people of that sort. He had disputes with his colleagues, for instance Blake Edwards, who had directed the Pink Panther films.

Sellers had a script for a revival, called The Romance of the Pink Panther, in his possession at the Dorchester Hotel on the day of his death. His weak heart, which gave him trouble in 1964, 1977, and again in 1979, finally caused his death in 1980.

Further Reading

Peter Sellers co-authored two books, Seller's Market (1966) with Joe Hyams, and The Book of the Goons (1974) with Spike Milligan. Other books on Sellers include Peter Evans, Peter Sellers: The Man Behind the Mask (1968, rev. ed. 1981); A. Walker, Peter Sellers: The Authorized Biography (1981); Michael Sellers with Sarah and Victoria Sellers, P.S.: I Love You, Peter Sellers, 1951-1980 (1981); and D. Sylvester, Peter Sellers: An Illustrated Biography (1981).

Additional Sources

Evans, Peter, Peter Sellers, the mask behind the mask, New York, N.Y.: New American Library, 1980.

Lewis, Roger, The life and death of Peter Sellers, London: Century, 1994.

Sellers, Michael, P.S. I love you: an intimate portrait of Peter Sellers, New York: E.P. Dutton, 1982.

Walker, Alexander, Peter Sellers, the authorized biography, New York: Macmillan, 1981.

For more information on Peter Sellers, visit Britannica.com.

Quotes:

"There used to be a real me, but I had it surgically removed."

"Let us learn to appreciate there will be times when the trees will be bare, and look forward to the time when we may pick the fruit."