Richard Pettyfer was born in London on 2nd June 1960. The family moved to Hertfordshire in 1964. He is the son of Rita M. (Spooner) and Arthur Alexander Pettyfer. His father, who was born in Australia to English parents, died in 1988. He has one sister.

He has dual nationality, British/Australian. He played rugby and cricket for the county and rugby for England schools, was the county canoeing champion and studied karate for many years. He played percussion in the National Youth Orchestra and sang as a choirboy in Worcester cathedral. He moved to London at 16 and went to the Arts Educational Drama School for three years, winning the most promising student award. In his year at drama school were Martin Clunes, Caroline Quentin and Maria Freedman.

He is an RFU qualified rugby coach and rugby fanatic and a lifelong fan of Harlequins RFC. He speaks Italian and has done shows in both French and German.

He is the father of film actor Alex Pettyfer, of whom he is immensely proud. He has worked for over forty years on TV and in the West End theatre appearing in more than 30 West End shows ,(including the original casts of Cats and Mamma Mia),as well as seasons with the Royal Shakespeare Company, The Royal National Theatre and The New Shakespeare Company at Regents Park Open Air Theatre, appearing with Millicent Martin and Topol. He was awarded the 'Gypsy Robe' (awarded to the person in a new company who has performed in the most West End and Broadway shows), during his stint at the Royal National Theatre in 'South Pacific'.

He has been privileged to work with too many creative greats to mention them all, but a few would be,Trevor Nunn, Sam Mendes, Jerome Robbins, Leonard Bernstein, Arthur Laurents, Bob Fosse, Neil Simon, Marvin Hamlisch, Don Black, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Benny and Bjorn (Abba), to name but a few. He started out doing TV as a dancer/singer and appeared for eighteen years in such TV shows as The Two Ronnies, The Mike Yarwood series, The Paul Daniels series, The Michael Barrymore series, The Lena Zavaroni series, The Seaside Specials series, Arrivals 1&2, Top Of The Pops (in a group called Zoo), The Stanley Baxter series, Miss World (three times), The Bruce Forsyth show, Stephenson's Rocket and nine Royal Variety Shows. Latterly as a straight actor he has appeared in The Blurring Between (a short film), The BBC/HBO co-production of Stuart: A Life Backwards, The BBC production of Bleak House (2 episodes), the Channel 4 show The IT Crowd, The Interceptor, The Alienist,"Angel of Darkness and Pennyworth. He has featured in more than twenty TV commercials and idents as well as pop videos with, among others, Diana Ross and Elton John.

He has also directed productions of Me And My Girl, Jesus Christ Superstar, and choreographed and co-directed the national tour of That's Amore.

Richard also appears on more than twenty recordings of cast albums.

He had one ambition recently fulfilled and that was to work with his son Alex, when they recently finished filming together in Poland.