Peter Mann follows Glenn McCrory on a journey from king of the ring to West End star

HAVING ruled the world as the cruiserweight king in the 1980s; County Durham boxer, Glenn McCrory, could not envisage how the future would look, let alone that he’d be cast in a West End show as well

McCrory created a little piece of history in making his drama debut, appearing at the Leicester Square Theatre in Adam Morley Theatre Company’s chilling production of Daphne du Maurier’s 1952 short story, The Birds, adapted by Conor McPherson. The play is where the 1963 Alfred Hitchcock chiller of the same name first emanated.

McCrory turned his back on acting to concentrate on sport and it paid dividends when, over a nine year spell (between 1984 and 1993) the lad from Annfield Plain took on all-comers in the ring.

After an ill-fated trip to Russia in mid-1989, McCrory hung up his boxing gloves and joined the newly-launched Sky Sports channel as a pundit and, alongside Adam Smith and Jonny Nelson, is a household name.

But when the chance came, McCrory went back to the stage, after gaining a slightly accidental route back into the world of thespians.

“It was a case of when I had retired from professional boxing, I wanted to go back to my second love of acting but along came Sky Sports. With the arrival of Sky it became a choice of passion against paying the bills, that’s how I saw it, and I was whisked well and truly away with that. We had a very small team though back then, just a few of us, but now I’m the old man and I’ve suddenly got a lot more time on my hands.

“I was on the Talk Sport radio show for 90 minutes and the conversation got round to my love of acting and I said that I wanted to get back into stage work. A few days later I was taken aback when I received first an email, and then a phone call from theatre director Adam Morley. During our discussion I was informed that he wanted me to be the lead role in a play.”

Having been cast as Nat and appeared alongside award-winning actress and comedienne Alice Marshall (who played Julia), and theatre actress of the year Emma Taylor (in the role of Diane), McCrory says he's ready for more.

“It’s a post-apocalyptic chiller set in a world where society has disintegrated and the birds attack humans at every given opportunity. I played the lead as one of three strangers with dark pasts who find themselves thrown together and trying to survive in a new world and we end up hiding in a boarded-up house where dangers come from above and within.

“It was a worrying thing for me to be playing the lead, especially as I was only given ten days’ notice. I mean, I have trouble remembering the shopping list at home, so I thought, 'Wow, this is going to be hard but if I’m going to act then Ill just have to go out there and do it'.”

The 51-year-old had a big advantage over other boxers in the acting department because he has made appearances in TV dramas such as Casualty, Rumble, Our Friends in the North, Crocodile Shoes II and Quayside. But he's is thrilled at what he's accomplished, even if his Sky colleague Jonny Nelson is still astounded by McCrory's change of career path. However, his Sky boxing colleagues went along to see The Brids plus sporting stars Darren Barker, Spencer Oliver, and Lloyd Honeyghan.

“It’s been great getting back to acting and it adds yet another string to my bow. Granted it’s been tough for me, especially being in nearly 15 of the 16 scenes pretty much every night for a month, but it’s been thrilling to have been given this opportunity and I’m looking at plenty of other acting gigs to keep me busy over the next 12 months. However, I'm still saying to myself, 'Jeez, what am I doing, I’m in a West End play.”