Colin Friels

Colin Friels (born 25 September 1952) is a Scottish-born Australian actor.

Background and training

Friels was born in Kilwinning, Ayrshire, Scotland. His mother was a mill worker and his father a joiner. He lived in Kilbirnie until 1963, when his family moved to Australia, arriving in Darwin, Northern Territory before settling in the Melbourne suburb of Brighton. He worked as a bricklayer's labourer before studying at the prestigious National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA), and graduated from there in 1976, with actors such as Linden Wilkinson and Michael Siberry.

Acting career

Friels career began with work mostly in theatre and television. In 1980 Friels was a presenter on the long-running children's series Play School. His first film role was in the unreleased Prisoners (1981), starring with Tatum O'Neal. The film was allegedly so bad that Tatum's father Ryan O'Neal purchased the rights to the film to prevent it from ever screening. His first actual appearance in film was in Monkey Grip (1982), an adaptation of a novel by Helen Garner, where he starred alongside Noni Hazlehurst.