Bruce Venables
During the 1970’s Bruce was a member of the Royal Hong Kong Police Force. During his years in what was then a British Crown Colony he attained inspectorate rank and served as a launch commander on gunboats in the Marine Division and was for a year, commanding officer of the Counter Terrorist Unit at Kai Tak Airport.
Bruce met his wife Judy Nunn in the early 80’s and was immediately attracted to the bright lights of the world of entertainment. He traded his badge and gun for a top hat and cane and was soon immersed in the world of song and dance. Blessed with a beautiful singing voice, he played Joe Gargery in the musical of Great Expectations and toured New Zealand in the world premier of the musical Full Marx.
Bruce has had equal success in film appearing in nearly thirty feature films to date including David Williamson’s Emerald City, Evil Angels with Meryl Streep and his personal favourite, On Our Selection with Geoffrey Rush, Leo KcKern and Dame Joan Sutherland. Other films include Mr Reliable with Colin Friels, River Street with Aden Young, Paperback Hero with Hugh Jackman and Claudia Karvan and Bootmen by the creators of the international dance spectacular Tap Dogs and The Crop, You Can’t Stop The Murders and The Honourable Wally Norman, with Sean Macallef and Greg Pickaver (better known as H.G. Nelson of Roy and H.G. fame).
Bruce’s television credits include The Jack Davey Story, A Long Way From Home with Julie Christine, Ben Elton’s Stark, Good Guys Bad Guys, Blue Heelers, Water Rats, Wildside, Murder Call, Love Is A Four Letter Word, Infamous Victory: Ben Chifley's Battle for Coal and the ABC satires Backberner and CNNnn to mention a few.
Bruce recently starred with Jacki Weaver in John Doyle’s (aka Rampaging Roy Slaven) new play ‘The Pig Iron People’ at the Opera House which received rave reviews.
Bruce is also the author of the best selling novel A Necessary Evil centred on the NSW Police Force in the bad old days of the 50s and 60s. He is also the author of “The Hong Kong Trilogy” the first novel of which was The Time of the Dragons released in 2005 and the second Two Tigers One Mountain released in 2008. The final book Scattered Monkeys will be released in 2011.
In June of 2003, a book of Bruce’s poetical works was released entitled The Spirit of the Bush. It was launched by Bob Carr, the Premier of New South Wales at a press conference at Parliament House Sydney. Bruce donated all proceeds from the book to the Drought Relief Appeal via the Wesley Mission.