He was born Leonard Gary Oldman on the 21st of March, 1958, his family
living in Hatcham Park Road, close to New Cross Gate station in one of
south London's rougher areas. His mother was an Irishwoman named Kathleen,
his father was Len, a former sailor who'd toiled in the engine-room (and was later
a welder and pipe-fitter), the couple having met in Cardiff during World War 2.

Gary Leonard Oldman (born March 21, 1958) is a double BAFTA and Saturn Award winning,
Emmy and Screen Actors Guild Award-nominated English actor, filmmaker and occasional musician.
He is well known to film audiences for his roles in films such as State of Grace, Bram Stoker's Dracula,
True Romance, Léon, The Fifth Element, The Contender, Batman Begins and the Harry Potter film series.
Oldman has also portrayed a significant number of real-life historical figures on screen, such as Joe Orton,
Lee Harvey Oswald, Ludwig van Beethoven, Pontius Pilate and perhaps most notably, Sid Vicious,
his portrayal of whom in 1986 biopic Sid & Nancy was listed as one of Premiere Magazine's
"100 Greatest Performances of All Time". Oldman is generally regarded as one of England's best known
and most diverse actors, having used a different speaking voice for every film role, as well as playing
a broad range of demanding roles.

In 1997 Oldman directed, produced, and wrote the award-winning Nil by Mouth, a movie partially based on
his own childhood.