Mary Gyles

Artist Bio

Born and raised in West Belfast, Mary grew up moving between the city and the border town of Dundalk, where weekends spent with her dad first sparked her fascination with accents and the stories they tell.

A childhood spent surrounded by overflowing bookcases shaped her love of reading aloud, poetry and performance. By sixth form, Friday nights often meant poetry readings around Belfast, where she would jump on the mic to perform her own writing. That passion for storytelling led her to study Acting at the University of Wales before completing a Master’s at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama.

Mary describes herself as a character actor at heart, happiest when experimenting with voices, accents and personalities. Her stage work includes Mrs Welsh in Blue Stockings at Lyric Theatre Belfast and Sally Poppy in The Welkin with the Richard Burton Company, alongside new writing projects where she explored everything from Cockney dialects to dystopian dictators.

Offstage, she loves hiking, comedy and animation – and is just as likely to be inventing voices for animals on a countryside walk as she is analysing the accent choices in her favourite performances!

Playing Accents