{{Short description|English actor, singer, and composer}} {{about|the English actor|the American trumpeter with a similar birth name|Chris Griffin (musician)}} {{Use British English|date=January 2025}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2025}} {{Infobox person | name = Gordon Griffin | honorific_suffix = {{post-nominals|country=UK|size=100|MBE}} | image = File:Gordon Griffin.jpg | caption = Griffin in 2023 | birth_name = Gordon Cuthbert Griffin | birth_date = {{birth date and age|df=yes|1942|12|19}} | birth_place = Gilsland, Northumberland, England | occupation = Actor | years_active = 1963–present | website = {{URL|https://www.gordongriffin.com}} }}
'''Gordon Cuthbert Griffin''' MBE (born 19 December 1942) is an English actor, audiobook reader, casting director, dialogue coach, singer, composer and lyricist.
==Early life== Gordon comes from Newcastle-upon-Tyne, though he was actually born in Gilsland in Northumberland. He trained at Rose Bruford College.<ref>The Spotlight, London WC2, successive editions</ref>
==Career== As a stage actor, he has half a century's experience of working in theatres up and down the British Isles, and in English-speaking productions overseas. He took part in the first national tour of ''Godspell'', and played in ''Julius Caesar'' and in ''Murder in the Cathedral'' at Chichester Festival Theatre. Other UK regional theatres where he has performed include Derby Playhouse and the Octagon Theatre, Bolton.<ref>The Stage Yearbook pub Carson & Comerford, London, successive years</ref>
For twenty years he has been Casting Director for The English Theatre of Hamburg and has cast over fifty plays, including ''The Importance of Being Earnest'', ''Twelfth Night'', ''As You Like It'', ''Arms and the Man'', ''Candida'', ''Blithe Spirit'', ''The Caretaker'', ''Private Lives'' and ''The Circle'', as well as the plays of LaBute and David Mamet.<ref>Theatrical Art and Entertainment Industry Contacts, Stage Section, pub.by Spotlight Publications, London, successive editions</ref>
As a cabaret singer he has performed with his singing partner Francoise Geller in the UK and elsewhere. He has composed music and lyrics for productions such as ''The Circle'', ''Educating Rita'', ''When the Reaper Calls'', ''Over the River'', ''Through the Woods'' and ''April in Paris''.<ref>Theatre World Annual ed by Frances Stephens, pub. Rockliff, London, successive years</ref>
His first film job, in ''Arabesque'', required him to play a scene with Gregory Peck and Sophia Loren.<ref>The British Film Catalogue 1895-1985, Ed.Denis Gifford, Volume One, Third Edition, Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, 2000. {{ISBN|0-7153-8835-5}}</ref>
On television he has been a presenter on ''Play School'', he played Inky in two series of ''Chips' Comic'' for Channel 4 and he spoke the first line in the first episode of ''Byker Grove''.<ref>Encyclopaedia of Television Ed. Horace Newcomb, Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, First Edition 1997 {{ISBN| 1884964265}}</ref>
Gordon has worked as a dialect coach on ''Byker Grove'' and ''Kavanagh QC''.<ref>Encyclopaedia of Television Ed. Horace Newcomb, Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers, Second Edition 2004 {{ISBN| 978-1884964268}}</ref>
Through doing radio drama he realised that he could display great versatility with his voice alone, accessing a greater range of parts than would otherwise be possible. (For instance, in the late 1960s when well into his twenties he took over the part of Billy the eldest grandson in ''The Dales'', formerly ''Mrs Dale's Diary''.
He 'got in on the ground floor' when audiobooks started to be recorded. For many years he has been a voiceover specialist and has recorded nearly a thousand audiobooks, mostly unabridged.<ref name="over700">{{cite web|title=Over 900 titles and counting!|url=https://gordongriffin.com/ggnewsite2/|publisher=Gordon Griffin|accessdate=23 January 2025}} ''Full listing of titles, 979 as of January 2025''</ref> The subjects have been as varied as Homer's ''Odyssey'', Orwell's ''Nineteen Eighty-Four'' and novels by H. G. Wells and Jules Verne, as well as more modern writers like Hilary Mantel and Melvyn Bragg. Also many titles in the ''Golden Age of Murder'' series for the British Library, and non-fiction titles such as ''Elegy: The First Day on the Somme'', and ''Breakfast is a Dangerous Meal'' by Terence Kealey, among many others. ''AudioFile Magazine'' wrote: "Griffin is not just a narrator, but an artist of the Spoken Word. He is in the top five of the most borrowed audiobook narrators in the world."<ref>[http://www.audiofilemagazine.com/ AudioFile Magazine], Silver St, Portland ME</ref> In 2015-2016 his 2015 reading of ''Kate Ellis'' 's ''The Death Season'' was the sixth most borrowed adult audiobook from UK public libraries, as reported by the Public Lending Right office.<ref name="plr15-16">{{cite web|title=Most borrowed titles: June 2015-June 2016: Audio Titles (Adult)|url=https://www.plr.uk.com/mediaCentre/mostBorrowedTitles/top20Titles/2015-2016Top20Titles.pdf|publisher=PLR Office|accessdate=6 July 2017|page=5}}</ref>
His more unusual audio recordings include having been the courteous voice advising alighting passengers to "Mind the gap, please" on the London Underground.<ref name="lyall">{{cite news|last1=Lyall|first1=Ellie|title=Actor from Whitley Bay to receive MBE|url=http://www.newsguardian.co.uk/news/actor-from-whitley-bay-to-receive-mbe-1-8601432|accessdate=6 July 2017|work=The News Guardian|date=16 June 2017|archive-date=21 June 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170621043644/http://www.newsguardian.co.uk/news/actor-from-whitley-bay-to-receive-mbe-1-8601432|url-status=dead}}</ref>
In 2017, Gordon was appointed MBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours List "For services to People with Sight Impairment".<ref>{{London Gazette |issue= 61962|supp=1 |date= 16 June 2017|page= B18}}</ref>
==Publication==
In 2020, Griffin published his memoir ''Speaking Volumes''.<ref name=Speaking>{{cite book|last=Griffin|first=Gordon|title=Speaking Volumes|year=2020|publisher=Austin Macauley Ltd|isbn=978-1528989206}}</ref>
==Selected Screen Credits== * Fanshawe in ''Arabesque'' * Len in ''Doctor in the House (TV series)'' * Dr Ericson (lead) in ''Tableau of Love'' * Sam in ''Doomwatch'' * Alistair in ''Apocalypse Watch'' * Vicar (lead) in ''The Gingerbread House'' * John Major in ''Westminster on Trial'' * Mr Flanders in ''The Fragile Heart'' * Michael Warner in ''Byker Grove'' (7 episodes) * Francy Nolan in ''When the Boat Comes In'' * Cyril Collier in ''The Likely Lads'' * Doug in ''A Family at War''<ref>TV credits in successive volumes of Radio Times and TV Times, Westminster Arts Library, 35 St Martins Street, London WC2</ref>
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== *{{official website|https://gordongriffin.com/}} *{{cite web | url=http://www.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2ba33d99d6 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210302014511/https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2ba33d99d6 | url-status=dead | archive-date=March 2, 2021 | title=Gordon Griffin | publisher=British Film Institute | website=Explore film & TV / Films, TV and people}} *{{imdb name|0341206|Gordon Griffin}} *[http://audiofilemagazine.com Audio File Magazine's website]
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Griffin, Gordon}} Category:English male actors Category:Audiobook narrators Category:1942 births Category:Living people Category:Members of the Order of the British Empire Category:People from Gilsland Category:Male actors from Northumberland Category:Male actors from Newcastle upon Tyne