Alan Williams

Alan Williams is a British actor and playwright whose work has spanned film, television, and theater in Britain and Canada. Born in Manchester in 1954, he learned much of his craft as an apprentice at Hull Truck Theatre. He staged the Cockroach trilogy, a set of solo plays, at London's Bush Theatre and Toronto's International Theatre Festival, then stayed in Toronto as Tarragon Theatre's writer in residence. He later taught theater at the University of Winnipeg and wrote plays such as The Warlord of Willowdale and The White Dogs of Texas. Michael McNamara adapted the Cockroach trilogy into the 1996 film The Cockroach that Ate Cincinnati, which earned Williams a Genie Award nomination for Best Actor. He also acted opposite Linda Griffiths in The Darling Family and its 1994 film version. After moving back to England, he appeared in films such as Vera Drake and The Life and Death of Peter Sellers, and in series including Coronation Street and Luther.