Gerald Rhoderick Charles Dickens (born 9 October 1963) is a British actor and performer known in the United Kingdom and the United States for his one man shows based on the novels of his great great grandfather, Charles Dickens. He was the President of the Dickens Fellowship from 2005 to 2007.[1]
The fourth child and second son of David Kenneth Charles Dickens (1925–2005) and his wife Betty (1927–2010), Gerald Dickens is the grandson of Sir Gerald Charles Dickens RN (after whom he was named) and the great grandson of Sir Henry Fielding Dickens KC; he is also the cousin of author Monica Dickens, biographer and writer Lucinda Hawksley and actor Harry Lloyd.[2] Dickens attended Huntleys Secondary School for Boys in Tunbridge Wells in Kent.
Inspired by a performance of Nicholas Nickleby by the Royal Shakespeare Company to become an actor, Gerald Dickens first performed his solo version of A Christmas Carol in America in 1993,[3] returning annually to perform at historic hotels, libraries, theatres and Dickens festivals. In 2009, Dickens' American tour included such Christmas companies as Vaillancourt Folk Art[4] and Byers Choice[5] and has yielded national and local press.[6] [7]
Based on the readings performed by Charles Dickens himself during his own British and American tours, Gerald Dickens performs extracts from The Pickwick Papers, David Copperfield, Oliver Twist, Great Expectations, Nicholas Nickleby and A Christmas Carol among others,[8] in the latter creating 26 characters in a performance described by The New York Times as "a once in a lifetime brush with literary history."[9]
Dickens has recorded unabridged audiobooks of The Pickwick Papers[10] and Nicholas Nickleby. In December 2011 he appeared on the BBC's Songs of Praise.
Originally from Goudhurst in Kent, Dickens now lives in Abingdon in Oxfordshire with his partner Liz Hayes. With his former wife he has a son, Cameron Thomas Charles Dickens (born in 1999).
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