Gareth has
managed to die in a surprisingly large number of roles. The RIP symbol is
shown against performances he is known to have died in.This section is continuously under development, with more details of Gareth's activities being added as we hear about them.
Note: the dates given for TV/Radio shows are where possible the first showing of the first episode where applicable, not when they were made.
Gareth has
managed to die in a surprisingly large number of roles. The RIP symbol is
shown against performances he is known to have died in.
Gareth has
been known to bemoan the fact that he never gets to play lovers.
The statistics seem to bear him out. Heart symbols indicate a romance, they
appear to be heavily outnumbered by tombstones. (Parts where he is already married
don't qualify. 
)
Gareth has said that he does't want to be thought of as just a Welsh actor,
but as an actor who can do English and Welsh characters with equal ease. He
has lived for a long time in England, and now in Scotland, after his early
years in Wales. He has been cast in a lot of Welsh roles over the years.
Leeks indicate Welsh parts.
Material here, comes from many sources including :- Blake's 7 magazine, Chris Blenkarn, Joyce Bowen, Sue Clerc, Robert Cheadle, Sue Cowley, Pat Fenech, The Freedom City Gazette (FCG), Horizon magazine, Julia Jones, Andrew Kearley, Gareth Randell, Judith Proctor, The Prydonian Renegade (March 96), Together Again - Action, TV Zone Special #4, Stellar Quines, Dundee Rep Theatre, Theatre Clwyd, The Magenta Partnership, Royal Lyceum Theatre - Edinburgh, Alan Stevens, Pete Wallbank, Andy Hopkinson, Mark Thompson, The Scottish Theatre Archive, Blake's 7 The Inside Story, The Archives of The Royal Shakespeare Company, Sheelagh Wells, Gareth Thomas and some very nice people who have asked not to be identified.
| Date | Medium | Event | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 12 Feb 1945 | History | Born in Wales
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| 1964 - 1966 | History | At RADA (Royal Academy of Dramatic
Arts) Note some of the plays below while at RADA were not full plays but sections from plays. Gareth (Horizon NL#21): I actually got into acting by accident. I decided I wanted to carry on being a student, and I thought: well, I can't paint, so I'll try acting. I went back to one of my teachers at school who'd been in charge of drama, etc., and asked if he would coach me. I then auditioned for RADA, which was then the only drama school I knew existed in those days! I got into RADA, and one day halfway through the two year course, I was coming downstairs and found myself thinking: I quite like this game, it's rather fun! I then decided that as long as I could cope with my responsibilities financially, I might as well carry on acting. I've been fairly lucky, so I've kept going. But that was how I got in. Purely by accident, because I decided I wanted to go on being a student, and then was lucky enough to get into drama school. Gareth (FCG#7): One of the teachers who was teaching so-called "technique"... There were sixteen people in the class, and he gave each of us a different Shakespeare speech, and he said to me, "During the course of the speech, Gareth, I want you to go away, learn it, work at it, come back, do it for me, and during the course of the speech I want you to stand on your head against the wall there, I want you to pick up this chair by the leg, I want you to walk three times down there, I want you to pick your nose," and various other things. We all sat there, "What's this?" However, when you're students, you go and you do what you're told. So we worked hard at our speeches, we came back and we did them. I did my speech, found a place where I thought it would be reasonable for Hamlet too actually do a handstand against the wall, picked up the chair, walked around and did everything else and he criticised: "That worked for me, that didn't work for me," and at the end of about three days, when we had all done our speeches, he said, "I dare say all of you are wondering what the fuck I've been doing. What a damned silly exercise! Well, I'll tell you what I've been doing. If you can make me belive all those damn silly things I asked you to do, you go out to the professional theatre, and anything any director ever asked you to do, you could make it work, and there aren't many people who can do that." That was the most valuable lesson I learned at RADA. If a diector tells me "On that word, I want you to move over there," I may disagree with him, I may argue, but I can make it work. Stephen Grief (Blake's 7 the Inside Story): On the first day (at RADA), we were given a talk by the principal, then were told "Now you're starting your first term, and just to explain to you how things go here, somebody from the fourth term is going to give you a talk." In walked this guy with a beard, wearing a leotard; a very bouncy, smiley, jokey guy who put us at our ease right away, who said "Hello, my name is Gareth Thomas." He made all of us feel extremely relaxed and laughed and joked like we were part of a big club, and went through the general points of what we were to do in our first term. Then he got up and said goodbye, and we all felt very much at ease. I'll never forget that, and Gareth and I have remained good friends ever since. Gareth talking to the Edinburgh News:"In my first theatre production my big scene involved walking on stage and opening a door for somebody. "I walked on to the stage, opened the door . . . and it came off its hinges. So at the end of my first ever professional stage appearance I had to pick up the door and walk off stage with it." Note he was there for 7 terms spanning 1964 to 1966 we are not yet sure which are in which year.
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| 1960's | TV Adverts | Soap Powder and Beer Gareth (Horizon NL#21): I've done some voice overs, and would love to do more, because you're not immediately identifiable. A lot of people disagree with me on this one, but my attitude and my agent's also, is not to do visual adverts because to do that you either have to be very careful what I say here - I don't mean it disparagingly - you either have to be unknown or very well known to get away with it. My agent once said to me: "I won't let you do adverts, because if I put you up for Hamlet - I'm too old for that now, that's just an example - if I put you up for Hamlet, it's going to be very difficult for the director to see you as Hamlet if he's seen you advertising washing powder five times a night for the last ten weeks." I could see his point, and so that has been my policy. When I was first into the business I did do a couple of adverts, but none since. | ||
| 1978 | Directing | The Importance of being Oscar At the Questor's theatre in London. This is an amateur theatre that allows small proffessional groups to hire it. The show ran for a week and was produced on a very tight budget. This starred Simon MacCorkindale. Sheelagh Wells was also involved with some aspects of the production, such as getting hold of furniture for use as scenery. This was produced by Pendant Entertainment Productions Ltd. This was produced elsewhere (the Cambridge Festival and Ealing) but we are not sure that Gareth was involoved with the earlier productions. | ||
| 1981? | Charity Walk | Gareth along with many other actors and personailities led by Henry Cooper, walked around White City Stadium to raise money for the Variety Club (a charity run by actors), this raised £30,000. | ||
| Sep 1988 | Audio Tape | Under Milk Wood
by Dylan Thomas. Gareth played Mog Edwards - this also stars seemingly every
actor and singer in Wales - including Anthony Hopkins, Jonathan Pryce, Sian
Philips, Tom Jones, Bonnie Tyler, Mary Hopkin, Philip Madoc, Windsor Davies,
Sir Geraint Evans, Ruth Madoc, Aled Jones, Ray Smith, Freddie Jones and Sir
Harry Secombe. This recording was released in 1988. A few years later, virtually the identical cast was brought together again and the performance was filmed. We believe that about an hour of this was shown on Television. The audio cassette was re-released at this time and the copyright date was changed to 1992. However the audio tape is not actually a recording of the filmed performance, but simply the 1988 recording re-packaged. Sadly, this tape is no longer avilable. This wa definately shown in the US, and was probably shown by LWT (London Weekend Television) in 1988. Review
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| Late 1989 | Video | Masquerade Introduced a video tape about makeup for Sheelagh Wells. | ||
| 1990 | Written | Blythe Spirits Gareth wrote several short stories about a small community of monks. Written sometime previously (pre 1988?) these were fan published in 1990. | ||
| 1 July 1991 | Signing | HMV Store in London to autograph the 1991 video releases. | ||
| 1992 | Audio Tape | Under Milk Wood
by Dylan Thomas. Gareth played Mog Edwards - this also stars seemingly every
actor and singer in Wales - including Anthony Hopkins, Jonathan Pryce, Sian
Philips, Tom Jones, Bonnie Tyler, Mary Hopkin, Philip Madoc, Windsor Davies,
Sir Geraint Evans, Ruth Madoc, Aled Jones, Ray Smith, Freddie Jones and Sir
Harry Secombe. This recording was released in 1988, a few years later, virtually the identical cast was brought together again and the performance was filmed. We believe that about an hour of this was shown on Television. The audio cassette was re-released at this time and the copyright date was changed to 1992. However the audio tape is not actually a recording of the filmed performance, but simply the 1988 recording re-packaged. This 1992 performance, may or may not have been the performance of Under Milk Wood that was in aid of the Princes trust. Gareth took part in a production of Under Milk Wood to help raise money for the Prince of Wales Trust, apparently some time in 1994 or 1995. The Prince of Wales Trust helps young people get started in life. | ||
| 18 Feb 1992 | Appearance | Harrow Ideal Home Exhibition Opened up the exhibition and then made personal apperancess each day (18-20th) to help publicise the event because a friend was running it. | ||
| Early 95 | Radio |
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| 1995 | Audio Tape | The Mark of Kane
The tape consists of two stories, one on each side of the tape. The first
story involves Travis before he reaches Freedom City and looks at some
events relating to the Andromedans. It also involves a mutoid and a bounty
hunter called Kane. With Brian Croucher (Travis II) The second story involves Blake and takes place shortly after Jenna's death. There are some links to the first story - Kane and the mutoid reappear. We also get to meet Tando (one of Blake's fellow bounty hunters). See Merchandise for more details. | ||
| 1995 | Audio Tape |
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| 1995 | Workshop | Actors Workshop with Mickey Rooney, Gareth played Oberon in A Midsummers Night Dream. | ||
| 3 June 1995 | Audio Tape | Travis: the Final Act Audio tape about Travis (Brian Croucher Travis II), using some of Blake's dialogue from the show - no new material from Gareth. This was released before December 1992. | ||
| 1 Aug 1995 | Gathering | B7 Cast reunion
Stringfellows nightclub, London, a general publicity event for the video
re-release. This included Gareth Thomas, Paul Darrow, David Jackson, Jan Chappell, Michael Keating, Sally Knyvette, Stephen Grief and Peter Tuddenham. At the event, Diane Gies asked: Anything else in the pipeline? Gareth: I'm doing an episode of Casualty soon. Actually, I missed out on an advert recently. I don't normally do adverts, but I would have done this one as it was abroad - I was up for the part of a Bank Manager in a French Bank. My agent told me that they had picked me out of the final twelve, but then decided that they wanted someone younger so they started seeing a group of 20 year olds. So I'm now officially too old to be a Bank Manager - even in France.
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| 12 Aug 1995 | Signing | Autograph Signing The Movie Palace (an SF shop not a cinema), London, more publicity for the videos. | ||
| 16 Sep 1995 | Signing | Autograph Signing at Playhouse Video in Stevenage, with Paul Darrow. More publicity for the videos. | ||
| Oct 1995 | Audio Tape |
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| 1st Feb 1996 | Radio Quiz | Was a contestant in Radio 4's SF quiz show "To Boldly Go" along with Hattie Hayridge (Holly of Red Dwarf). | ||
| 1996 | Audio Tape |
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| 1996 | History | Associate of RADA Gareth was unanimously voted an associate of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, after his nomination by Stephen Grief. | ||
| 1997 | Audio Tape |
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| 19 Aug 1997 | TV Quiz |
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| 30 June 1997 | Audio Tape | Logic of Empire
This tape which was produced by Alan Stevens, who also produced The Mark
of Kane.
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| 28 Sep 1997 | Audio Tape |
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| 21 Feb 1998 | Signing | Autograph Signing Gareth Thomas and Jacqueline Pearce were signing items at Hollywood Superstore, 16-18 St Giles High St, London. | ||
| Early 1998 | Audio Tape |
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| 29 Jun 1998 | Opening | Fab Cafe Gareth acted as the guest
celebrity/host at the opening nights of this Sci-Fi Cafe/Bar in Manchester,
until 2nd of July.
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| Early 1999 | TV Adverts |
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| Early 1999 | Audio Tape |
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| 21 June 1999 | Audio CD |
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| 20 Aug 1999 | Audio CD |
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| 3 Sep 1999 | Audio CD |
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| Mar 2000 | Audio CD |
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| 2 May 2000 | Video |
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| 9 May 2000 | Apperance |
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| 28 Jun 2000 | CD |
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| 1 Jul 2000 | Signing |
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| Sep 2000 | Video |
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| Jan 2001 | CD |
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| 25 Jun 2001 | CD | Dalek Empire 1 Recorded 6 May 2001. | ||
| 6 Aug 2001 | CD | Dalek Empire 2 Recorded 3 June 2001. | ||
| 25 Oct 2001 | CD | Soldiers of Love 8 This was recorded on 2 Sept 2001. | ||
| 19 Nov 2001 | Reading | The Last Moons Gareth did a play reading, on Monday 19th November - lunchtime. Doing a play reading Upstairs at The Gatehouse (Pub/Theatre), Highgate. The performance began at 12.30pm - the play is 'The Last Moons' by Furial Bordon, adapted by William Weaver. Director is David Newman. Gareth says Act 2 is him doing a monologue. The play takes a wry, intimate and funny look at the subject of Old Age! | ||
| 25 Nov 2001 | Signing | The Who Shop
Gareth's was signing the newly released Big Finish CD 'Dalek Empire - Pt 3'
at the Who Shop, 4 Station Parade, High Street North, East Ham,
London E6 1JD. From 12 noon to 3pm Sunday 25th November. Joining him was
be Stephen Greif who was signing copies of the Big Finish CD 'Primeval'.
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| 29 Oct 2001 | CD | Dalek Empire 3 Recorded 2 Sep 2001. | ||
| 19 Jan 2002 | CD | Dalek Empire 4 | ||
| 19 Jan 2002 | Signing | 10th Planet Gareth was signing copies of the newly released Big Finish CD 'Dalek Empire IV - 'Project Infinity' in which he stars as Kalendorf. At the 10th Planet Bookshop, Unit 36 Vicarage Field, Shopping Centre, Ripple Road, Barking, Essex, IG11 8DQ. On Saturday 19th January, from 1/4pm. | ||
| 25 Mar 2002 | CD | Soldiers of Love 9 This was recorded on 2 Sept 2001. | ||
| 18 May 2002 | Signing | The Videodrome
Gareth was in a signing session at the The Videodrome, The
Shambles, Worcester on Saturday 18th May from 10am-1pm
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| 25 June 2002 | CD | Soldiers of Love 10 and 11 These were recorded on 2 June 2002. | ||
| 25 Aug 2002 | Signing | Memorabili
On August 25th at Memorabilia, SECC, Glasgow from 11am to 4pm.
Both Gareth and Paul Darrow were there.
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| 8 May 2006 | Radio | A Patriot for Us Gareth appeared for 5 consecutive days reading Radio 4's Book of the Week - 'A Patriot for Us' starting Monday 8 May on Radio 4 at 9.45/10am. Each day's episode was repeated at half past midnight. 'A Patriot for Us' is the biography of playwright John Osborne, written by John Heilpern. Source Radio Times and Horizon | ||
| Unknown | Directing | Unknown Something by Alan Ayckbourn. This was also produced by Pendant Entertainment Productions Ltd. |
Last updated on 06th of May 2002.
