Peterson personified 'Camelot' chivalry

Several years ago, during one of many interviews over the years with Robert Peterson, I thought it was time to confront him about something I had put off far too long.

"It's all your fault, Bob," I told him (he always preferred "Bob" to" Robert"). "You're the one person I can blame for getting me 'hooked' on live theater."

He grinned his infectious grin and seemed sort of pleased.

In the summer of 1963, when I was in my early 20s, I made a trip to San Francisco and noticed that the first national touring production of "Camelot" was playing at a theater there, with Kathryn Grayson as Guenevere.

As it turned out, for the matinee performance (with tickets something like $4.50!), Grayson had been replaced by her understudy, Jan Moody. But the real buzz in the audience during intermission was the handsome young lad playing Lancelot — someone we'd never heard of before. His name was Robert Peterson.

The production really blew me away. I never had seen scenery, costumes — or talent — like that in any of the cut-rate "community-theater" productions of my hometown, Twin Falls, Idaho.

Over the past several years of covering theater and Eugene Jelesnik's "pops" concerts — which frequently featured Bob as a guest artist — I came to realize just how lucky we were to have Robert Peterson living and performing here in Utah.

He could have developed a solid career on Broadway, but had he stayed in New York, he probably would have been forever type-cast as a musical-theater performer. In Utah, he was able to raise his family in a culture he felt was best for them and pursue a much more diverse professional career.

In nearly 40 years of performing at Pioneer Memorial Theatre and dozens of other local venues, he proved that he was not only a wonderful singer but a gifted actor as well. He could handle comedy and drama as easily as he could sing "If I Were a Rich Man."

Which brings up a side of Peterson's career that not many outside the "theater community" know about.

A few years ago, an actress sitting behind me during a play I was reviewing asked if I knew about the "Bob's Wives' Club." She said it was made up of those who have played all the Gueneveres, Goldes, Eliza Dolittles, Nelly Forbushes, Marian Paroos and Aldonzas opposite Peterson in countless productions of, respectively, "Camelot," "Fiddler on the Roof," "My Fair Lady," "South Pacific," "The Music Man" and "Man of La Mancha."

Maybe Kathryn Grayson is an honorary member.

And I can guarantee that every one of them would vouch for what a true gentleman Robert Peterson always was. He obviously took all that Knights of the Round Table chivalry in "Camelot" quite seriously.

Personally, I will be eternally grateful to Bob for getting me hooked on theater.

What he did on his side of the footlights has certainly enriched the lives of thousands who were out in the audience.

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E-mail: ivan@desnews.com