Gary Ballard

Gary Ballard earned his B.A. in the double majors of journalism and theatre from Ole Miss (or the University of Mississippi, for those addicted to precision).  Because he never grew physically large enough to become a professional wrestler, he did the next best thing in the 1960s by muscling his way onto the pages of such periodicals as Wrestling Revue, Wrestling World and The Ring Wrestling where he penned articles on many roughhouse practitioners of the mat game like Treacherous Phillips, Corsica Joe, Tojo Yamamoto, Cobra Jim Kimble, Bulldog Mack York and Al Spider Galento along with two National Wrestling Alliance world heavyweight champions of the day, Lou Thesz and Gene Kiniski.  In the 1980s he started writing articles on actors, directors, casting directors, make-up artists, costume designers, visual effects specialists, playwrights, set designers, various industry hyphenates and a handful of Academy Award nominees for Drama-Logue of Hollywood.  He likes to brag he published Drama-Logue articles on celebrities ranging from Steve Allen to Oprah Winfrey, a boastful assertion that nevertheless happens to be true.  He’s especially proud of the two living legends of that era that he interviewed and helped to further immortalize: actress Lillian Gish and director Rouben Mamoulian.  Shortly after John Wayne’s death he published an article on him in Firehouse Magazine by drawing the connection that out of all the cowboys, cops and fighters the Duke portrayed he only played a fireman once on screen in a picture called Hellfighters, a fictionalized retelling of the life of Red Adair, an oil well firefighting specialist who served as a consultant on the film.  He worked with Stephanie Edwards and her husband Murray MacLeod on a radio show called Moot Pointe Lodge where he helped write various skits, created the character of Clark-Gable Cloudyjohn and portrayed that character as well.  He wrote a play, a screenplay and two novels, all of which are gathering dust while awaiting a few additional trips through the keyboard to render them more saleable.  He might have written even more over the last fifty years, but he’s been busy pursuing an acting career also which occupied a great deal of his time and energy.  For a list of his credits in that field, check him out at IMDB.

To read Gary’s articles, CLICK HERE