Gary Stevenson (born 30 November 1957), better known as Gary Lewis, is a Scottish actor. He has had roles in films such as Billy Elliot (2000), Gangs of New York (2002), Joyeux Noël (2005) and Eragon (2006), as well as major roles in the television docudrama Supervolcano, the Starz series Outlander, and the BBC One thriller Vigil.
For Billy Elliot he received a nomination for the BAFTA Film Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role and for Mo (2010) he received a nomination for the BAFTA TV Award for Best Supporting Actor for playing Adam Ingram.
Early life
Stevenson was born on 30 November 1957 in Easterhouse, Glasgow, the middle of three children; his father was a coppersmith and his mother worked in a local biscuit factory. After leaving school, he had a series of jobs, including as a street sweeper and working in a library.
He completed a social science degree at Glasgow College of Technology (now Glasgow Caledonian University), graduating with honours in 1983. Encouraged by his high school English teacher, he read voraciously and eventually decided to pursue an acting career.
Theatre
In 1979, Lewis starred in writer Freddy Anderson's Fringe First Award-winning play Krassivy, based on the life of Socialist school teacher John Maclean. Although he had pursued amateur theatrics, Lewis was 32 before he committed to acting, joining Robert Carlyle's newly formed Raindog Theatre. There he performed in plays such as One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Ecstasy and Wasted.
He also worked with the 7:84 Theatre Company on The Grapes of Wrath, The Arches Theatre Company's production of Harold Pinter's The Birthday Party, and starred in One Two Hey by Glaswegian author James Kelman.
Film work
1993–2004
In 1993, with the support of his friend actor-director Peter Mullan, Lewis was cast in the short film Close. After working together on the short, both actors appeared in Danny Boyle's 1994 thriller Shallow Grave, alongside Ewan McGregor and Christopher Eccleston. Lewis also was featured in Mullan's subsequent shorts Good Day for the Bad Guys (1995) and the award-winning Fridge (1996).
Lewis joined director Kenneth Loach's unofficial stock company, lending support to his two mentors in separate films. With Robert Carlyle, he co-starred in Carla's Song (1996), while he played a recovering alcoholic alongside Mullan in My Name Is Joe (1998). Between the two films, Lewis was featured in Sigma Films' short California Sunshine (1997). He again worked with Mullan, who cast Lewis as over-righteous elder sibling Thomas in Orphans (1998), an examination of a dysfunctional family. That same year he was featured in director Albert Pyun's independent film Postmortem, director Sean McGuire's short film The Good Son, director Kenny Glenaan's short The Whirlpool, short film The Lucky Suit opposite Robert Carlyle, and screenwriter Barry Gornell's short film Sonny's Pride.
In 1999, Lewis starred in Ayub Khan Din's dramatic comedy East is East, and Bill Forsyth's comedy Gregory's Two Girls. He went on to star with Max Beesley in The Match (1999).
He landed an international breakthrough in Billy Elliot (2000). Lewis's portrayal of a grief-stricken father, coping with the 1984-85 miner's strike and raising a son who wants to become a ballet dancer, earned him a BAFTA nomination for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.
In 2000, Lewis starred in May Miles Thomas's drama One Life Stand. Adapted as a film, it premiered at the Edinburgh Film Festival, featuring Michael Caine as a boxing coach who was possibly involved in a murder, and released as Shiner. It screened at the San Sebastian Film Festival. Lewis finished the year with several short films, including What Where, a 12-minute short with Sean McGinley based upon Samuel Beckett's play of the same name, director David Mackenzie's Marcie's Dowry, The Elevator alongside Ashley Walters, Long Haul alongside Simone Lahbib, Clean with actor Stephen McCole, and director David McKay's Caesar. He appeared in an additional short film in 2001, Rob of the Rovers, which followed a day in the life of gym teacher Rob Meadows.
Lewis worked with director Giles MacKinnon twice in 2002. Revenge thriller The Escapist, which featured Lewis in the role of Ron, was followed by a turn as Detective Inspector French in the crime drama Pure. He went to Rome's Cinecittà Studios to join the ensemble cast of Martin Scorsese's Gangs of New York, an epic tale of gang warfare among the lower classes in 1860s New York City. Lewis portrayed McGloin, an Irish-American meant to embody the shift in mid-nineteenth century attitudes towards other immigrants.
2003 was another strong year with Lewis playing different roles. The first was Posh Pictures' The Fall of Shug McCracken, which tackled the subject of employee theft and labour unions. Next was Danish director Soren Kragh-Jacobsen's film Skagerrak, a romantic drama set in Scotland, which saw Lewis in a supporting role as a local Glaswegian. The last, a film noir drama from director and writer May Miles Thomas titled Solid Air, which is about the relationship between a sickly father (Maurice Roeves) and his compulsive gambler son (Brian McCardie).
2004–2013
Working with director Kenneth Loach again, Lewis starred in the 2004 love story Ae Fond Kiss..., which takes its name from a Robert Burns poem. That same year, he had a role in director Friðrik Þór Friðriksson's drama Niceland (Population 1.000.002) alongside Peter Capaldi and Kerry Fox. His next project was Stephen Whittaker's The Rocket Post. Filmed on the island of Taransay, Scotland, the film explores a German scientist's idea to deliver mail via rockets in the late 1930s. Director Peter Timm's film My Brother Is a Dog, features Lewis as the Antiquitätenhändler in a film about a young girl wishing for a dog. Lewis ended the year with two films about the post 9/11 tension between the Western and Arab worlds. First was a supporting role in writer Simon Beaufoy's Yasmin, set in Northern England before and after the 9/11 attacks. Second was Sally Potter's fourth feature film Yes, which views the post-traumatic rift through the lens of two lovers caught in the divide.
In 2005, Lewis starred in Christian Carion's international production of the film Joyeux Noël. Set in WWI, the film explores the "Christmas Truce" of 1914 between the armies of three countries. In a departure from previous films, Lewis was next featured in director Danny Cannon's football film Goal! The Dream Begins, which focuses on a Mexican football player trying out for the Newcastle United Football Club. Clive Gordon's 2006 film Cargo, a psychological thriller, featured Lewis opposite Daniel Bruhl and Peter Mullan. As the skipper of a bankrupt Scottish fishing trawler in True North, Lewis and actor Martin Compston tackle the subject of migrant smuggling and the effects it has on those making the journey. At the end of 2005, Lewis starred as Hrothgar in 20th Century Fox's live action adaptation of Christopher Paolini's hit fantasy trilogy Eragon.
The 2008 British black comedy Three and Out (released as A Deal Is A Deal in Australia), from director Johnathan Gershfield, saw Lewis in the supporting role of Callaghan. The film focuses on a train conductor who tries to use a little known three strikes rule of the London train service to force an early retirement and payout for himself. Screened at the Edinburgh Film Festival, Lewis's next film was director Robert Rae's debut film Trouble Sleeping, which tells the story of a Palestinian refugee's struggles in the UK. Psychological thriller Dorothy Mills, directed by Agnes Merlet, featured Lewis as the brainwashing pastor of a small community on a bleak Irish island. His last film of 2008 was Mark Aldridge's drama Blessed, alongside James Nesbitt and Lil Woods.
Reprising the role of Mal Braithwaite, Lewis began 2009 with the third instalment of Andrew Morahan's football series entitled Goal! III: Taking On the World. Wasted, his next…