Alastair Macaulay - Critic of the Performing Arts

Preparatory School and Deacon’s 1964-1973

Alastair was a scholar, house prefect and graced the stage whilst at Felsted before reading Classics at Clare College, Cambridge.
He has been Chief Dance Critic at The New York Times since 2007, based in New York. Before that, he worked, in London, as Chief Theatre Critic of The Financial Times between 1994 and 2007, as Chief Dance Critic to the Times Literary Supplement 1996-2006, and as a leading examiner and lecturer in dance history at various academic institutions in Britain. He was also Guest Dance Critic to The New Yorker in 1988 and 1992. 

Alastair comments: “A career reviewing the performing arts was never in my sights when I was at Felsted. Now, however, I see that I still draw on many things I learnt there - English, Greek, Latin, Ancient History as academic subjects, acting in many school plays, discussions with staff and fellow students about music and theatre, essays on classical philosophy, history, and literature. I had no idea that working as advertisement editor for ‘The Felstedian’ magazine would lead me anywhere. After forty years in professional journalism on both sides of the Atlantic, I see that it has certainly done so.”