Jon Peters

John H. Peters (born June 2, 1945) is an American film producer and former hairdresser. Early life Peters was born on June 2, 1945, in Van Nuys, California. Peters is of Cherokee (father) and Italian (mother) descent. While growing up in a rough neighborhood, Peters' father died when he was eight years old and his mother later remarried; Peters was later expelled from school and sent to reform school for a year when he was 12. Career As a child, Peters was cast as an extra in Cecil B. DeMille's 1956 film The Ten Commandments. Prior to becoming a producer, Peters ran away from home at the age of 14 and moved to New York City, where he found work as a hairdresser and took his first job of dyeing women's pubic hair. Upon moving back to Los Angeles, he opened two salons and later took over his uncles' salon on Rodeo Drive, where he met Sue Mengers. In the early 1970s, he learned about Jay Sebring's method of cutting hair from Sebring's protégé Jim Markham, whereupon he designed a short wig worn by Barbra Streisand in the 1974 comedy film For Pete's Sake; Peters and Streisand then began a romantic relationship. He produced both Streisand's studio album ButterFly (1974) and her remake of A Star Is Born (1976), after being introduced through and working with Mengers. Of Peters, Mengers said, "He's like trying to withstand a hurricane. If it weren't for Jon, I'd be 20 years younger." For years, he worked with the Jon Peters Organization, and attempted to work with friends Peter Guber and Neil Bogart at a film division of Boardwalk Records, but in exchange for getting his profits on Caddyshack, he was forced to join PolyGram Pictures in 1980 and fired two years later to form The Guber-Peters Company.