Peter Lambda

Born Budapest, Hungary, Austria-Hungary, 1911, only child of Laslos Lévy and Katalin Freund. ? Pupil, Model Gymnasium, Budapest.

Medical student in Vienna, Austria, 1929-1934, then art student, including study at Paris, France and Prague, Czechoslovakia, 1934-193X. Sculptor, Budapest, 193X+, taking father's pen-name 'Lambda' (the Greek letter) as a surname. Married Lilla Bauer, 193X. Portrait subjects included: Lili Darvas, Frida Gombaszögi, István Hollós, Jenö Tersánszky Józsi.

Exhibited in Budapest, lastly at the Tamás Galériá, May, 1938 (catalogue by Bertalan Hatvany).

Emigrated Summer 1938 to England, UK. Known as Vilmos Peter Levy. During Second World War worked for UK Government 'Crown Film Unit [gb]' and BBC as scriptwriter. Immediately post-war, industrial designer, ICI; worked in perspex and plastics, including contact-lens production. Naturalised as UK citizen and took name Peter Lambda (aka William Peter Lambda). Marriage to Lilla Bauer dissolved.

Married Annette Millar, 1945. Freelance sculptor, portraits included, theatrical: Leslie Banks, Dorothy Dickson, John Gielgud, Wendy Hiller and Laurence Olivier and political: Winston Churchill, Aneurin Bevan, Kingsley Wood. Family friend Sigmund Freud also a subject. Later, also American sitters, including Lena Horne and Linda Christian. Divorced from Annette Millar, 195X. Alongside sculpture wrote plays and radio scripts.

1958: married Betty Paul; with her and alone, wrote television dramas for BBC and ITV, also German-language plays for Continental broadcasters from mid-1950s to 1970s. Sculpture work reduced due to writing career and then deteriorating sight.

1987, moved to Tibberton, Gloucestershire, England, UK.