Bruce Parry

Since finishing with the BBC after Arctic, Parry has concentrated on directing and producing his debut feature documentary for the big screen called TAWAI - A voice from the forest. The film aims to take a deeper look into some of the issues touched upon within his television programmes and the personal lessons which he has learnt from his explorations. Production commenced on the winter solstice 2012. The UK release is set for the autumn equinox 2017.

In 2010, over the course of one bright Arctic summer, Parry immersed himself in the lives of people living in the Far North and has recently released a book about his travels. From the Inuit of Greenland to Alaska whalers and gold-diggers, Canadian oil-men, scientists and bands of reindeer herders in the remote valleys of Siberia, Parry encountered first-hand the threats to culture, landscape and wildlife of the Arctic.

In 2008, Parry journeyed for seven and a half months through Peru and Brazil for his series entitled Amazon where he looked at such issues as cocaine, oil, logging, slavery, dams, soya, cattle ranching and epidemics. He spent time with government officials, indigenous peoples, illegal loggers, drug manufacturers and cattle ranchers.

In 2007 a spokesperson for Survival International praised the positive effects of Parry and his documentaries, noting that the "programmes bring tribal peoples vividly to life. Bruce Parry's interest in them and his respect for their ways of life come across very strongly. We believe that public awareness and the force of public opinion is absolutely crucial in ensuring that tribal peoples' rights are respected."

In 2007, Parry received Royal Television Society Award for Best Presenter for Tribe. In 2008 he received the BAFTA Cymru Award for Best On-Screen Presenter for Tribe and his second Royal Television Society Award for Best Presenter for Amazon. He also won the BAFTA award for Factual Series in 2009. His documentaries have also won a number of awards from various film festivals around the world.

Next Parry was chosen to lead an expedition across Greenland in the guise of Captain Scott for a period remake of Scott's fateful last trip to the South Pole entitled Blizzard: Race to the Pole in 2006.

The following year he made a return to the BBC1's Extreme Lives series and made a programme with Debra Searle about a 700 km canoe race down the Yukon River in Canada entitled "Yukon Quest". The same year he returned to the Children's BBC to lead a trek for Serious Desert taking a group of children to Namibia's Skeleton Coast to work with the endangered black rhino. The show won the BAFTA Award for Best Children's Factual in 2004.

In 2004, Parry started filming the prime time BBC2 documentary series Tribe in which he lived with various tribal groups exactly as they do in order to better understand their culture. The first series of Tribe saw Parry living with indigenous peoples in Gabon, India, Indonesia, Ethiopia, Mongolia and Venezuela.

Parry first appeared on television in 2002 in an episode of BBC1's Extreme Lives series entitled "Cannibals and Crampons". Bruce planned, filmed, directed and presented the documentary episode with his friend Mark Anstice. The film was a first-hand account of their successful journey to climb Puncak Mandala in the Indonesian part of New Guinea. It is the second highest mountain of Australasia but is little known and rarely climbed.

Parry was chosen in 2002 to lead the Children's BBC expedition show Serious Jungle, taking four boys and four girls aged 11 to 15 to Borneo to work with orangutans. The show won the 2003 Royal Television Society Award for Best Children's Factual. Also in 2002 Parry appeared as the straight-faced instructor in three episodes of Danger! 50,000 Volts! opposite Nick Frost.

Parry was born into a devoutly Christian and military family from Dorset with his father being a Major in the Royal Artillery. He attended the Wells Cathedral School as a boarder between 1978 and 1987 and was Head of House, a Combined Cadet Force cadet, and a member of the Rugby First XV.

Bruce Parry (born 17 March 1969) is an English documentarian, indigenous rights advocate, author, explorer, trek leader and former Royal Marines commando officer. He employs an ethnographic style and a form of participant observation for his documentaries.