Peter Lindahl (1712 in

Karlskrona Karlskrona (, , ) is a locality and the seat of Karlskrona Municipality, Blekinge County, Sweden with a population of 66,675 in 2018. It is also the capital of Blekinge County. Karlskrona is known as Sweden's only baroque city and is host to Swed ...

– 19 December 1792 in Ånstad, Örebro), was a Swedish stage actor and

theatre director A theatre director or stage director is a professional in the theatre field who oversees and orchestrates the mounting of a theatre production such as a play, opera, dance, drama, musical theatre performance, etc. by unifying various endeavors a ...

. He belonged to the most known of the pioneer generation of actors at the first Swedish theatre. He was the director of the Lindahl theater company in 1754-68, one of the two first travelling Swedish language theater companies.

Life

Peter Lindahl's father was a secretary, as well as he himself before he became an actor. In 1737, he participated in the first Swedish language original play to be performed at inauguration of the first Swedish theatre in ''

Bollhuset Bollhuset, also called (The Big Ball House), (Ball House Theater), and Gamla Bollhuset (Old Ball House) at various times, was the name of the first theater in Stockholm, Sweden; it was the first Swedish theater and the first real theater buildin ...

'' in

Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...

, ''Den Svenska Sprätthöken'' by

Carl Gyllenborg Count Carl Gyllenborg (7 March 1679 – 9 December 1746) was a Swedish statesman and author. Biography He was born in Stockholm, the son of Count Jacob Gyllenborg (1648-1701). His father was a Member of Parliament and of the Royal Council, who ...

, in the part of Måns. As such, he was also the first Swedish actor known by name to have performed a par tin a different gender, as the male Måns reveals in the play that he is actually as woman, Brita, dressed as a man. In 1740–54, he was one of the three directors in the board of directors at the theatre with Charles Langlois and Johan Palmberg. He was regarded as a comedian star and the theatre's main

Harlequin Harlequin (; it, Arlecchino ; lmo, Arlechin, Bergamasque dialect, Bergamasque pronunciation ) is the best-known of the ''zanni'' or comic servant characters from the Italian language, Italian ''commedia dell'arte'', associated with the city o ...

interpreter, and acted in plays by

Molière Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (, ; 15 January 1622 (baptised) – 17 February 1673), known by his stage name Molière (, , ), was a French playwright, actor, and poet, widely regarded as one of the greatest writers in the French language and world ...

Voltaire François-Marie Arouet (; 21 November 169430 May 1778) was a French Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher. Known by his ''Pen name, nom de plume'' M. de Voltaire (; also ; ), he was famous for his wit, and his ...

and

Corneille Pierre Corneille (; 6 June 1606 – 1 October 1684) was a French tragedian. He is generally considered one of the three great seventeenth-century French dramatists, along with Molière and Racine. As a young man, he earned the valuable patronag ...

. In 1754, the Swedish theatre was evicted from the localities of Bollhuset and replaced with the French

Du Londel Troupe The Du Londel Troupe was a French 18th-century theatre troupe. From 1753 to 1771, it was active as the French Theatre of Sweden, where it played a great part in that country's theatre history. The French troupe performed in Copenhagen in Denmark ...

. The Swedish actors split in two travelling theaters, one under

Petter Stenborg Petter Stenborg (1719 – 6 November 1781) was a Swedish stage actor and theater director. He was the director of the Stenborg Company or ''Svenska Comoedi-truppen'' from 1758 onward and as such the director of the '' Humlegårdsteatern'' (17 ...

and one under Lindahl, the likely first Swedish language travelling troupe, in companionship with Johan Bergholtz. He married his colleague the actress Margareta Maria Fabritz in 1742. His theatre troupe was taken over by his

son-in-law Son-in-Law (22 April 1911 – 15 May 1941) was a British Thoroughbred racehorse and an influential sire, especially for sport horses. The National Horseracing Museum says Son-in-Law is "probably the best and most distinguished stayer this count ...

Carl Seuerling Carl Gottfried Seuerling (1727-1795) was a German born, Swedish stage actor and theater director. He was the director of the Seuerling theater Company in 1768-93 and as such the leader of one of only two professional Swedish language theater comp ...

in 1768, and later by his daughter,

Margareta Seuerling Margaret(h)a Seuerling née ''Lindahl'' (1747–1820) was a Swedish actress and Theatre director in a travelling theatre company, perhaps the most known travelling actress of her time in Scandinavia, active in both Sweden and Finland. She was on ...

. He and his spouse continued to play in their son-in-law's theatre until the 1780s.

References

* Svensk Uppslagsbok (Swedish dictionary) 1947 edition
Svenskt biografiskt handlexikon
* Andersson, Ingvar (red.), Gustavianskt: 771-1810: en bokfilm, y utg. Wahlström & Widstrand, Stockholm, 1979 * Tryggve Byström: Svenska komedien 1737-1754, Centraltryckeriet AB, Borås 1981. . {{DEFAULTSORT:Lindahl, Peter 1712 births 1792 deaths Swedish theatre directors 18th-century Swedish male actors Age of Liberty people 18th-century theatre managers