Rosemary Long

PATRON

Rosemary Long has been messing about with words since she edited the school magazine (in Coatbridge) back in the days when 'How Much is That Doggie in the Window?' was in the Hit Parade. From a local paper she moved to the (long defunct) Glasgow Evening Citizen as assistant woman's editor at the tender age of 19.

Since then she has covered - mainly for the Glasgow Evening Times and The Herald - features, fashion, investigations, opinion columns, TV, theatre reviews, interviews (she once interviewed the scary Barbara Woodhouse, and, on another occasion, Barbara Cartland and her cosseted Pekingese) . "You name it, I seem to have written about it somewhere, sometime", she says. Several times she won Scottish Press Awards for her articles.

In the 1990s she spent eight years in The Gambia, writing about her life there for the (Glasgow) Herald, and producing two books based on her experiences. Today, however, although she still writes an occasional piece, she concentrates on tutoring feature-writing and related classes in Strathclyde University's Adult Education unit..

She has a son in social work, a daughter teaching English in Japan, another daughter teaching special needs children in Glasgow - and six grandchildren.

Gary Hollywood

PATRON

Gary Hollywood started acting at the ripe age of 12 when he won over viewers in his performance of Scottish Televisions police drama Taggart "Gingerbread".

He then went on to do various TV shows including Doctor Finlay, Crime Limited and Down To Earth to name a few, but it was Scottish Televisions soap opera "High Road" that was to make him a household name.

Gary's film credits include "The Boyhood of John Muir" where he played the title role for PBS in the states, "The Winter Guest" where he played alongside Oscar winning actress Emma Thompson and directed by Alan Rickman, "The Flying Scotsman" with Johnny Lee Miller and Brian Cox and most recently Peter Mullen's acclaimed "Neds".

He has worked extensively in the world of theatre over his 21 years but it was whilst working in Brendan’s theatre productions of "Mrs Brown's" trilogy that Gary returned to our households playing Dino Doyle in BBC1’s Mrs Brown’s Boys and picking up a collection of awards along the way, 2 BAFTA’S, TV choice, TV times, IFTA and National Television Awards !Gary is due to tour Australia with the hugely successful Mrs Brown’s Boys theatre show this year (2014)