Ireland – Spring Gala 2018

Dress-Code: Black-Tie

Band: Spring Break

Spirit of Ireland Recipient

Aidan Gillen

Biography

From a cunningly manipulative medieval statesman in “Game of Thrones,” to an ambitious, American politician in “The Wire,” Aidan Gillen is known for playing strong and morally complex characters, integral to culturally relevant narratives. Born in Dublin, Gillen is a Tony and SAG nominated actor with a career spanning two decades.

In 2011, Gillen joined the main cast of HBO’s groundbreaking series “Game of Thrones” and has portrayed Petyr ‘Littlefinger’ Baelish for seven seasons. His role garnered him an Irish Film and Television Award nomination and three Screen Actors Guild Award nominations in the category of Outstanding Performance of an Ensemble in a Drama Series. The show has received back to back Primetime Emmy Awards in 2015 and 2016 for Outstanding Drama Series.

Gillen was most recently seen opposite Debra Winger in A24’s “The Lovers,” Guy Ritchie’s “King Arthur: Legend of the Sword” and in the third installment of the “Maze Runner” series “Maze Runner: Death Cure.” Gillen can be seen in the fourth season of the BBC Two series “Peaky Blinders” which is currently streaming on Netflix.

Gillen’s next projects also include three biopics, “Bohemian Rhapsody,” from Fox which centers on Freddie Mercury and the iconic musical group Queen, the BBC Two miniseries “Dave Allen at Peace” and “James & Lucia,” which focuses on the life of author James Joyce. Additionally, he will topline the Robert Zemeckis produced series “Blue Book” from the History channel.

Gillen joined the main cast of HBO’s acclaimed series “The Wire,” in 2004 portraying Tommy Carcetti for three seasons. For this role, he received an Irish Film and Television Award for Best Actor in a Lead Role in Television. Gillen played Stuart Alan Jones in the ground-breaking Channel 4 television series, “Queer as Folk,” and its sequel, for which he received a British Academy Television Award nomination for Best Actor.

Gillen played crime boss John Boy in the acclaimed Irish crime-drama “Love/Hate” for which he received his third Irish Film and Television Award nomination and second win in 2011. That same year, he won the Best Actor award at Milan Film Festival for his performance in “Treacle Jr.” also picking up a Best Actor nomination at the British Independent Film Awards. Gillen also received an Irish Film and Television Award for Best Actor in 2014 for his portrayal of Charles J Haughey in the RTE Studios mini-series “Charlie.”

Past film credits include: “Sing Street,” “Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials” “Shadow Dance,” “Cavalry,” “Blitz,” “Shanghai Knights,” and Terry George’s “Some Mother’s Son.” His film “Pickups” which he wrote, produced and starred in, premiered at the 2017 Dublin Film Festival.

An accomplished stage actor, Gillen was nominated for an Irish Times Theatre Award for his portrayal of Teach, in the Dublin Gate Theatre’s 2007 production of David Mamet’s “American Buffalo.” That same year, he played Richard Roma in the West End production of “Glengarry Glen Ross.” In 2004, he was cast in the Broadway production of “The Caretaker” and earned a Tony nomination in the category of Best Featured Actor in a Play for his performance.