Biographies

His grandparents were The Edwards Traveling Players a 'Fit Up' Theatre Co. Fitting up, performing and moving on in towns, cities and villages throughout England. Tottering into his grandparents footsteps he started off his artistic life as an itinerant musician.

After some success he became bored with the endless round of alcohol, drugs and wild parties and reclassified himself as an actor/director. His chutzpah was rewarded when he won an Arts Council Fellowship to spend a year as Associate Director at Nottingham Playhouse working on a everything from Mother Goose to Krapps Last Tape. From this he set up Fittings with Felicity Shillingford and, in collaboration with Graeae, he produced, directed and (his ego knows no bounds) acted in, the seminal The Last Freakshow.

With Fittings he has directed The Fly, Mendel, Flesh N' Steel, Welcome to the Institute, The King of Fools with DASh which he scripted, and in collaboration with New Breed, The Irish Giant, which he also scripted. The latter won the Manchester Evening News Theatre Award for Best Fringe Production and was nominated for Best New Play.

Garry also co-wrote and directed The Buddy Bolden Experience and directed Heelz on Wheels (with Russell Barr).

He also made the films I Feel Like I'm Fixing to Fly: A Short film about Polevaulting which featured in the Manchester Commonwealth Games and The Second Coming which was selected for the BBC Short Film Festival. He has a couple of other short films to his name which have been shown at various festivals and spent a while working on Eastenders.

Acting credits include Nottingham Playhouse, Graeae, Unicorn, New Breed, Interplay, The Half Moon, Sounds of Progress and Theatre Workshop and various bits and bobs on Radio 4 and telly - The Bill and Silent Witness, on film in a Robbie Williams video Charity Case and in theatres playing the Dame in Theatre Royal Stratford East's Pinocchio and part of the drag act in wheelchairs that is Heelz on Wheels. Last xmas he was to be seen at Theatre Workshop in Tales of the Arabian Nights where he played the wicked Genie and Mother Baghdad!

He has worked as a consultant on access and equality issues and was the inaugural Artistic Director of both the DASh and Degenerate Festivals and SMAC 2k Shropshires Millenium celebrations. He has been a drama advisor for ACE and the Scottish Arts Council.

After a visit to Liverpool in 1989 I fell in love with the place and made it my home. In 1997, I graduated from John Moore's University with a degree in Literature, Life and Thought. Following this I started and ran a community based theatre company, Theatre of No Importance. In 1998 I began, in collaboration, Missing Marbles, an artist led performance company. I’ve also worked for Everyman Theatre, Kaboodle Productions, Mersey Producers and Rejects Revenge before joining Fittings, for what I’m looking forward to being a long and very happy venture.

I am very pleased to be in Liverpool at such an exciting time and to feel that I am playing a small part in contributing to its status as Capital of Culture 2008. I live with my husband and two daughters, have an eclectic taste in music and film, love entertaining my friends, red wine and computer games.