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Jason Barry
Biography
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jason Barry (born 14 December 1972) is an Irish actor. He is best known for his portrayal of Tommy Ryan in the 1997 blockbuster Titanic. However, he has also been in such movies as The Still Life for which he has won numerous awards.
He has been married to actress Nicola Charles since 18 August 2003 and the two founded Marathon Pictures LA. Their first daughter Freya Barry was born in January 2005, and their second daughter Nova, was born 27 July 2007.
Jason will make his directorial debut in the film "Easter sixteen". The film will star Guy Pearce and Gary Oldman.
Description above from the Wikipedia article Jason Barry, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Peter Swords King
Biography
Peter King (born 1955), also known as Peter Swords King, is a British Oscar-winning makeup artist who won the 2003 Academy Awards for Best Makeup for The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. He shared the award with filmmaker Richard Taylor. He was nominated again at the 2012 Academy Awards for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
Besides bringing movie characters to life by way of make-up and hairstyling, King, for the 13 dwarves in the movie The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, had to work on 1,000 drawings before finalising down to a single image. "We make the prosthetics, wigs, beards and then do a show-and-tell for each character in the film", was Peter's remark about his work. He is credited for his exemplary work of immortalising characters like King Kong and Marquis de Sade on celluloid.
His other movies include Quills, Thunderbirds Little Voice, The Importance of Being Earnest, An Ideal Husband, and The Avengers.
King has also won several BAFTA Awards. He has worked on nearly 40 films since 1982.
King is artistic director at Bath Academy of Media Makeup, a private school for makeup artistry in media and fashion.
Description above from the Wikipedia article Peter King (make-up artist), licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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James Cossins
Biography
James Cossins (4 December 1933 – 12 February 1997) was an English actor. Born in Beckenham, Kent, he became widely recognised as the abrupt, bewildered Mr Walt in the Fawlty Towers episode "The Hotel Inspectors" and as Mr Watson, the frustrated Public Relations training course instructor, in an episode of Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em.
Cossins was born in Beckenham and educated at the City of London School. After serving in the Royal Air Force, he trained at Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, where he won the silver medal in 1952.
Cossins first appeared in repertory theatre and at the Nottingham Playhouse. He played a wide range of characters throughout his colourful and extensive career on television and stage, often portraying blustering, pompous, crusty and cantankerous characters. Cossins appeared in Charley's Aunt at the Apollo Theatre in 1971 with Tom Courtenay, David Horovitch, Garth Forwood, Joanna McCallum, and Celia Bannerman. He appeared in more than forty films, including The Anniversary (recreating his West End stage role), and The Lost Continent (both 1968), Gandhi (1982), and The Man with the Golden Gun (1974).
On the small screen, Cossins appeared as a guest in a variety of shows, including The Likely Lads and Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads?, Minder, Bergerac, The Sweeney, Bless This House, Shadows, All Creatures Great and Small, Citizen Smith, Just William, The Good Life, L for Lester, Neville Dennis in Callan "Rules of the Game" (1972), Z-Cars, and as the regular character Bruce Westrop (in 1979) in Emmerdale Farm. He also played Major Bagstock in Dombey and Son (1983), and appeared in the first series of All in Good Faith in 1985. He played a magistrate in episodes of four different British sitcoms, Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads?, The Good Life, Citizen Smith and Minder.
Cossins's later appearances were limited by ill health and he lived in semi-retirement in Surrey. Cossins died from heart disease at the age of 63, in 1997
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Michael S. Heiser
Biography
Michael S. Heiser is an American biblical Old Testament scholar and Christian author. His area of expertise is the nature of the spiritual realm in the Bible, namely the Divine Council and hierarchy of the spiritual order. He is Executive Director of the School of Ministry at Celebration Church in Jacksonville, Florida. He was a Distance learning professor at Liberty University and Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Until 2019, he was scholar-in-residence at Faithlife Corporation.
He runs his own podcast, The Naked Bible and runs a ministry called Miqlat, dedicated to the production and dissemination of his content. Heiser appeared in the 2018 documentary film Fragments of Truth and in the 2019 documentary film The Unseen Realm. In 2019 Heiser released the book The World Turned Upside Down: Finding the Gospel in Stranger Things, referencing the Netflix series Stranger Things as analogies to Christian theology.
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Oliver Chris
Biography
Oliver Graham Chris is an English actor. He has appeared in television series, TV films, and on the stage. His work has included theatrical productions in London's West End and New York City's Broadway.
Chris was born in Royal Tunbridge Wells, Kent, on 7 November 1978. He passed his eleven-plus exam and attended Tunbridge Wells Grammar School for Boys before moving to the Michael Hall Steiner School in his fourth year. He later graduated from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. In 2005, he completed an evening class at Birkbeck College and was subsequently accepted for a degree course in history, politics and philosophy.
Chris has appeared in several comedy series, including The Office, Green Wing, According to Bex, Nathan Barley, The IT Crowd, Rescue Me and Bluestone 42.
In 2004, Chris re-wrote the lyrics to the Beatles' "Let It Be" to a song about the England football player Wayne Rooney and recorded it in collaboration with the actor Stephen Campbell Moore and a number of other actors and journalists. The song was reprised and re-recorded, with rewritten lyrics, for the 2006 Fifa World Cup and became a hit on YouTube, with 200,000 views.
Chris has also narrated most of the Alex Rider series of audiobooks by Anthony Horowitz, although Dan Stevens replaced him as reader for Snakehead, Crocodile Tears and Scorpia Rising.
In early 2006, Chris played the role of Captain Leonard in Sharpe's Challenge, starring Sean Bean, while 2007 saw him in the TV comedy Bonkers, written by Sally Wainwright as well as Petruchio in The Taming of the Shrew at the Wilton's Music Hall. In 2006, he also appeared as Christian in Cyrano de Bergerac at the Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester. He later appeared in Peter Hall's production of The Portrait of a Lady. He made his West End debut in late 2008 in Lisa Kron's comedy, Well. In 2010, he appeared alongside Judi Dench in Hall's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Rose Theatre, Kingston.
Chris was cast in Ben Miller's feature-length debut comedy film Huge, which premiered in June 2010. In 2011, saw him appear in two episodes of Silent Witness, whilst also playing one of the leading roles in the National Theatre production of One Man, Two Guvnors alongside James Corden. He appeared in three series of the BBC Three comedy Bluestone 42, about a British bomb disposal detachment in Afghanistan. He also played Dr Richard Truscott in the ITV medical drama series Breathless, set in the 1960s, which ran for one series from October 2013.
From 2014 to 2016, Chris played Prince William in the play King Charles III, appearing in the West End and on Broadway. In May 2017, he appeared in the same role in the BBC Two film adaptation.
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Jack O'Brien
Biography
Jack O'Brien (born June 18, 1939) is an American director, producer, writer and lyricist. He has won three Tony Awards and been nominated for seven more, and won five Drama Desk Awards.
O'Brien has directed and produced musicals, including The Full Monty and Hairspray, contemporary dramas such as The Piano Lesson, The Invention of Love and The Coast of Utopia, Shakespeare classics, including Hamlet and Henry IV (a combination of Part 1 and Part 2), and operas, including Il trittico at the Metropolitan Opera.
Description above from the Wikipedia article Jack O'Brien (director), licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
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Sean Connery
Biography
Sir Thomas Sean Connery (August 25, 1930 – October 31, 2020) was a Scottish actor and producer. He won an Academy Award, two BAFTA Awards (one being a BAFTA Academy Fellowship Award), and three Golden Globes, including the Cecil B. DeMille Award and a Henrietta Award. Connery was the first actor to portray the character James Bond in film, starring in seven Bond films (every film from Dr. No to You Only Live Twice, plus Diamonds Are Forever and Never Say Never Again), between 1962 and 1983. In 1988, Connery won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in The Untouchables. His films also include Marnie (1964), Murder on the Orient Express (1974), The Man Who Would Be King (1975), A Bridge Too Far (1977), Highlander (1986), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), The Hunt for Red October (1990), Dragonheart (1996), The Rock (1996), and Finding Forrester (2000).
Connery was polled in a 2004 The Sunday Herald as "The Greatest Living Scot" and in a 2011 EuroMillions survey as "Scotland's Greatest Living National Treasure". He was voted by People magazine as both the “Sexiest Man Alive" in 1989 and the "Sexiest Man of the Century” in 1999. He received a lifetime achievement award in the United States with a Kennedy Center Honor in 1999. Connery was knighted in the 2000 New Year Honours for services to film drama.
On October 31, 2020, Connery died at the age of 90.
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Thomas Essig
Biography
Thomas Essig is an American film producer, musician, actor. Thomas was the drummer in the Pittsburgh band The Prestons for a
few years until his job with McKesson as a Robot Tech took him to NY in 1999. In 2022, his
filmmaking/music career allowed him to move back to the Pittsburgh area where he has
family, longtime friends, and an undying devotion to the Pirates. He is now involved in the
Pittsburgh film community. In 2005 while living in Hudson, NY, the opportunity to act in live theater was offered to
him. He spent a couple of seasons performing in upstate New York at the Rhinebeck
Centre of the Arts. Noteworthy, he had a prominent role in the first run show, War Games,
A World War II Memoir by Sam Hall. He has on screen credits as well. The film career stems from being a musician, specifically a drummer from age 6. His
interest in writing and recording music began in the 80’s. Tom states. “Recording on a
Tascam 424 4 track cassette recorder was the greatest experience in learning the art of
audio engineering. Imagine recording a whole band, including a drum set on 4 tracks and
then make it sound good sonically.” By the 2000’s he was playing multiple instruments,
writing, and recording in the spare time from his job in robotics. In 2017, he started his
production company SSYY Productions Inc. (Stick Shift Yaya’s). Yes, there is a driving story
to the name. Thomas's career in film began in 2017 with the production of his short film Drive. (A film
that was created around 16 minutes of his music.) The Director of the short (Alex Knapp)
asked Thomas if he would help him get his first film made. During the production of that
film (Go/Don’t Go) in 2018, Tom began getting educated in the art of filmmaking. That
education continued into 2019 during production of his first film, Something Divine. Something Divine has won 6 awards including the prized Telly Award for Feature
Documentary. The film releases worldwide March 27,2026 on Amazon, Apple TV, Roku,
etc. In May of 2025 he was a panelist forthe Global Entertainment Showcase at the French
Riviera Film Festival during the Festival de Cannes. Executive Producer for the critically acclaimed feature film “Go/Don't Go”. Released
2021. Co-Executive Producer for the award-winning short “Through the Stars”. (2023) Actor, Film Score and Audio Engineer for a Pittsburgh production “The Monte Carlo”.
Written by David Ogrodowski, Directed by Jamie Lockhart. Release sometime in 2026. In the early stages of production is Tom’s new film “I’m the Drummer”. A true story of an
incredible lifetime of circumstances to find the truth.
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Billy Boyle
Biography
Billy Boyle is an Irish actor and singer on British film, television and stage. His recording career included five 45rpm singles for the Decca and Columbia labels, including the novelty song "My Baby's Crazy 'Bout Elvis" (Decca F 11503) in 1962. He is a veteran of the West End stage, having played leading roles in over 15 hit shows. In his first West End musical, Maggie May, he was nominated as best newcomer. Gower Champion then chose him to play Barnaby in Hello Dolly at The Theatre Royal Drury Lane. He appeared in Canterbury Tales at the Phoenix Theatre as The Clerk of Oxford. Harold Hobson, The Times critic said, "He was a breath of fresh air in the West-End" He went on to play leading roles in No Sex Please, We're British, Billy, What's a Nice Country, The Rivals, Love, Lust, & Marriage, Some Like It Hot, Disney's Beauty and the Beast, and in the original cast of Dirty Dancing. Lately he has appeared as Grandpa George and Grandpa Joe in Charlie and The Chocolate Factory at Drury Lane. In 2010, he was the Mysterious Man in the Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre production of Into the Woods.
His films include Stanley Kubrick's Barry Lyndon, Groupie Girl, Side by Side, Wild Geese II, The Scarlet and the Black, Round Ireland with a Fridge and A United Kingdom.
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Noel Purcell
Biography
Patrick Joseph Noel Purcell (23 December 1900 – 3 March 1985) was a distinguished Irish actor on stage, screen, and television. He appeared in the 1956 film Moby Dick and the 1962 film Mutiny on the Bounty.
Patrick Joseph Noel Purcell was the son of Dublin auctioneer Pierce Purcell and his second wife Catherine (née Hoban), an antique dealer. He was born at 11a, Lower Mercer Street, one of two houses owned by his mother's family.
Purcell was educated at Synge Street CBS. He lost the tip of his right index finger while making cigarette vending machines, and was also missing his entire left index finger due to a different accident while he was an apprentice carpenter, a feature which he exploited for dramatic effect in the film Mutiny on the Bounty (1962).
Purcell began his show business career at the age of 12 in Dublin's Gaiety Theatre. Later, he toured Ireland in a vaudeville act with Jimmy O'Dea. Stage-trained in the classics in Dublin, Purcell moved into films in 1934. He appeared in Captain Boycott (1947) and as the elderly sailor whose death marooned the lovers-to-be in the first sound film version of The Blue Lagoon (1949). He played a member of Captain Ahab's crew in Moby Dick (1956), Dan O'Flaherty in episode one, The Majesty of the Law, of The Rising of the Moon (1957), a gamekeeper in The List of Adrian Messenger (1963), and a barman in The Mackintosh Man (1973); the last two films were directed by John Huston. In 1955, he was an off-and-on regular on the British filmed TV series The Buccaneers (released to American TV in 1956). He narrated a Hibernian documentary, Seven Wonders of Ireland (1959). In 1962, he portrayed the lusty William McCoy in Lewis Milestone's Mutiny on the Bounty. He played a taciturn Irish in-law to Lebanese American entertainer Danny Thomas's character Danny Williams in a 1963 episode of The Danny Thomas Show. In 1971, he played the caring rabbi in the children's musical drama Flight of the Doves. He was the subject of This Is Your Life in 1958 when he was surprised by Eamonn Andrews at the BBC Television Theatre. Purcell also gained some recognition as a singer. Shortly after the Second World War, songwriter Leo Maguire composed "The Dublin Saunter" for him. He performed the song live for many years and later recorded it for the Glenside label. However, the recording was not a hit. As Purcell recalled many years later, "I don't think one person in the world bought it." However, over time it became one of the most favorite songs about Dublin, receiving countless air plays on radio programs. In his later years, Purcell was asked by RTÉ journalist Colm Connolly whether he had received many royalties down the years. Purcell replied: "Not a penny. I recorded it as a favor for a pal, Leo Maguire, who'd written it. No contract or anything, so I never got a fee or any payments."
In 1981 (on YouTube it's 1974) he recorded a spoken word version of Pete St. John's "Dublin in the Rare Old Times".
In June 1984, Purcell was given the Freedom of the City of Dublin. Nine months later, he died in his native city at the age of 84.
On 7 July 1941, Purcell married former child actress Eileen Marmion. They had four sons.
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