Biography
Peter Bergman earned his livelihood by generating laughter, first as one member of the four-person Firesign Theatre ensemble and later as one half of a performing partnership alongside fellow Firesign veteran Phil Proctor. Listeners familiar with the troupe’s recordings will identify his voice as Mudhead and Dr. Math on the album Don’t Crush That Dwarf, Hand Me the Pliers and as Babe on How Can You Be in Two Places at Once When You’re Not Anywhere at All?
Born in Shaker Heights, Ohio—a Cleveland suburb—in 1939, Bergman gained his initial exposure to radio and controversy as an early-morning disc jockey at his junior-high station. One morning, weary of repeating the standard headlines, he declared that Chinese Communists had seized the high school; the announcement cost him the position. While still in high school he organized a comedy troupe with classmates and arranged for a novelty single lampooning the 1956 Democratic convention to be pressed and aired on local Cleveland stations.
He departed for Yale University in 1957, where he encountered future Firesign Theatre colleague Phil Proctor within the drama department. The pair quickly formed a close friendship. By the mid-1960s both had relocated to the West Coast and begun contributing to broadcasts at Los Angeles station KPFK. At a station fundraiser Bergman met Phil Austin and David Ossman; the four soon collaborated on one another’s projects, most notably the free-form morning program Radio Free Oz, which Bergman co-hosted. An astrology enthusiast, Bergman observed that he, Proctor, Ossman, and Austin were all fire signs, supplying the ensemble with its name.
Once the Firesign Theatre’s radio programs and recordings achieved early success, Bergman and Proctor branched off as a duo. They released the album TV or Not TV and toured with it in 1973. Two further albums, What This Country Needs in 1975 and Give Us a Break in 1978, appeared under the same partnership yet never matched the critical or commercial impact of the quartet’s work. The pair also wrote and performed in several films, among them Americathon, for which they retained screen credit after handing their script to additional writers. Bergman remained active with the Firesign Theatre into the closing years of the century while sustaining himself through writing and performing for television and radio. He succumbed to leukemia in 2012.
Born in Shaker Heights, Ohio—a Cleveland suburb—in 1939, Bergman gained his initial exposure to radio and controversy as an early-morning disc jockey at his junior-high station. One morning, weary of repeating the standard headlines, he declared that Chinese Communists had seized the high school; the announcement cost him the position. While still in high school he organized a comedy troupe with classmates and arranged for a novelty single lampooning the 1956 Democratic convention to be pressed and aired on local Cleveland stations.
He departed for Yale University in 1957, where he encountered future Firesign Theatre colleague Phil Proctor within the drama department. The pair quickly formed a close friendship. By the mid-1960s both had relocated to the West Coast and begun contributing to broadcasts at Los Angeles station KPFK. At a station fundraiser Bergman met Phil Austin and David Ossman; the four soon collaborated on one another’s projects, most notably the free-form morning program Radio Free Oz, which Bergman co-hosted. An astrology enthusiast, Bergman observed that he, Proctor, Ossman, and Austin were all fire signs, supplying the ensemble with its name.
Once the Firesign Theatre’s radio programs and recordings achieved early success, Bergman and Proctor branched off as a duo. They released the album TV or Not TV and toured with it in 1973. Two further albums, What This Country Needs in 1975 and Give Us a Break in 1978, appeared under the same partnership yet never matched the critical or commercial impact of the quartet’s work. The pair also wrote and performed in several films, among them Americathon, for which they retained screen credit after handing their script to additional writers. Bergman remained active with the Firesign Theatre into the closing years of the century while sustaining himself through writing and performing for television and radio. He succumbed to leukemia in 2012.
Albums
