Gilroy,+Tom

Biographical Information:
Dates: 1951-  Dates in Ridgefield: c.1978

 screenwriter, actor, film producer, movie director, newspaper reporter

Tom Gilroy, a member of the Class of 1978 at Ridgefield High School, employs his way with words both on and off camera. The actor-filmmaker used his memories of Ridgefield--and used Ridgefield itself--to make his first feature-length film, //Spring Forward// in 1998. He wrote and directed the movie, which stars Ned Beatty and Liev Schreiber and which has won acclaim at major film festivals. After graduating from Boston College, Mr. Gilroy worked as a reporter at //The Ridgefield Press// and then went off to New York to attend the Lee Strasberg Institute. He started up a theater group for which he wrote, directed and acted in plays, and he has appeared in several films, including //Ken Loach’s Land// and //Freedom,// a tale of the Spanish civil war that earned an award at Cannes. One of the focal events in //Spring Forward// involves a parks department worker giving money to a homeless person, found sleeping under the bandstand in Ballard Park. "There were many acts, private acts of kindness and generosity that I saw when I was living here," Mr. Gilroy told //The Press// in 1998. "It is a place where many, many people gave what they could to the town, whether it was donating land for a park, or donating their time as volunteers." A two-time Sundance and three-time MacDowell Colony Fellow, his plays–notably //The Invisible Hand// and //Halcion Days//–have been produced around the world.

//The Haiku Year //(co-author), 2004 //Spring Forward, //2000 –Sources: Notable Ridgefielders–Jack Sanders; Wikipedia
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