Matthew Garber

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Matthew Garber

Karen Dotrice and Matthew Garber
in a publicity photo for Mary Poppins
Born Matthew Adam Garber
March 25, 1956(1956-03-25)
Stepney, London, England
Died 13 June 1977 (aged 21)
Royal Free Hospital, Hampstead, London, England

Matthew Adam Garber (25 March 1956[1] – 13 June 1977[2]) was an English actor best known for his role as Michael Banks in Walt Disney's Mary Poppins. Born in Stepney, London, England, to parents who had both performed on stage, he attended St Paul's Primary School in Winchmore Hill and Highgate School in Highgate, North London.

Garber made three films for Disney, then disappeared from public life. He died in 1977 at the age of 21.

Contents

[edit] Acting career

Garber made his screen debut at age seven in Disney's The Three Lives of Thomasina (1964). That same year, he and Thomasina co-star Karen Dotrice were hired to play Michael and Jane, the children of George Banks (David Tomlinson), who gets more than he bargained for when he hires a nanny named Mary Poppins. Disney's live-action/animated film adaptation of the Mary Poppins book series by P. L. Travers won five Academy Awards and made its stars world-famous.

Garber and Dotrice would pair up again in The Gnome-Mobile (1967) as the grandchildren of a rich lumber mogul (Walter Brennan) who stumble across a gnome forest and are asked to help keep the gnomes from dying off.

[edit] Death

Garber died on 13 June 1977 at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead, London, of hemorrhagic necrotising pancreatitis at the age of 21. On 24 October 2004, the Mail on Sunday ran an interview with Fergus Garber, identified as Garber's younger (by eight years) brother; he told reporters that Garber had contracted hepatitis—probably, he said, from eating "bad meat"—while traveling in India in 1976, and it had already spread to his pancreas when their father brought Garber back to England the following year. Fergus denied any suggestion that his brother was using drugs. Garber's body was later cremated.

Garber was posthumously named a Disney Legend in 2004; Fergus Garber accepted on his behalf.

[edit] Filmography

Year Film Role
1964 The Three Lives of Thomasina Geordie
Mary Poppins Michael Banks
1967 The Gnome-Mobile Rodney Winthrop

[edit] References

  1. ^ GRO Register of Births: JUN 1956 5d 746 STEPNEY - Matthew A. Garber, mmn = Ruffell
  2. ^ GRO Register of Deaths: JUN 1977 12 1869 HAMPSTEAD - Matthew Adam Garber, DoB = 25 Mar 1956

[edit] External links

Persondata
NAME Garber, Matthew
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION Actor
DATE OF BIRTH 1956-03-25
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH 1977-06-13
PLACE OF DEATH Royal Free Hospital, Hampstead, London