Peter is an acclaimed screenwriter and playwright.

He was writer in residence at the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1979-1980 and remains an Associate Artist there. His plays at the RSC include Singer, which originally starred Sir Antony Sher, and won the Time Out Best Play Award in 1989 and was nominated for Best New Play at the Oliviers. It was revived by the Oxford Stage Company in 2004, starring Ron Cook. Our Friends in the North, starring Jim Broadbent and Roger Allam won the 1982 John Whiting Award and was nominated for the Olivier Award for best play. Savage Amusement, which had won the Best Play Award at the National Student Drama Festival 1978, starred David Threlfall and Lesley Manville. Other theatre includes The Bodies, adapted from Émile Zola’s Thérèse Raquin for Live Theatre, Newcastle, in 2005, starring Jill Halfpenny, and Burnt by the Sun, adapted from the screenplay by Nikita Mikhalkov and Rustam Ibragimbekov, at the National Theatre in 2009, starring Ciaran Hinds and Rory Kinnear and directed by Howard Davies.