About Peggy Ramsay

Peggy Ramsay became probably the best known play agent in the United Kingdom during the second half of the Twentieth Century. She established her agency, firmly described as a play agency and not a literary agency, in 1953. It continued until her death in 1991 and then subsequently re-emerged and continues under the aegis of her trusted deputy Tom Erhardt in the name of Casarotto Ramsay.

During her lifetime she dedicated her principal activity to British theatre and acted for (sometimes found and always nurtured) the majority of the best known writers for the stage in this country. Radio, television and films all gained her attention but her devotion was to the stage and those who wrote for it.

Her multitude of clients is far too many to list here but her admirable biography by Colin Chambers ("Peggy" published by Nick Hern Books) has five pages of them, ranging from names as different as Alan Ayckbourn, Robert Bolt, David Hare and Alan Plater to Eugene Ionesco, Joe Orton, Stephen Poliakoff and J B Priestley.

When she died her estate amounted to some £1.5 million and was left for charitable purposes to help writers and writing for the stage with especial reference to her friends and clients. Her executors Laurence Harbottle and Simon Callow established the Peggy Ramsay Foundation in pursuance of this object and became its first trustees. With the other Trustees, listed above, the Foundation tries to carry out her wishes and helps individual writers and many writing projects.