Neil Pigot

Neil Pigot was born in Melbourne, the eldest son of a butcher turned commercial pilot, and his wife who would become one of Australia's pioneering female car sales people. At age 8, his family moved to Darwin and then South East Asia. He completed his schooling in Sydney. He then left his "dysfunctional family home" at the age of 17.^[1]

Pigot began work with the semi-professional Lieder Southern Regional Theatre in Goulburn, New South Wales, in the early 1980s, first appearing as Meriman the butler in Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest. He then worked in community theatre and on drama programmes with long term institutionalised adults at Kenmore Psychiatric Hospital, before joining Theatre ACT in 1984. After a time as a contract actor in Canberra, he established the Black Inc theatre company with Paul Corcoran, Tim Ferguson, and Ian Hagan. He performed at a late night cabaret, The Katt Klub, with many artists including the Doug Anthony Allstars.

He has played leading roles for all of Australia's major companies, including the Melbourne and Sydney Theatre Companies, Belvoir, Playbox/Malthouse, Queensland Theatre Company, and State Theatre Company of South Australia and also leading independent companies Brink.

Pigot's television credits include leading guest roles in over 20 television series and several telemovies, beginning with G.P. in the 1980s. Notable series include The Man from Snowy River, The Games, The Adventures of Lano and Woodley, The Secret Life of Us, Laid, Marshall Law, Wicked Science, Stingers, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries, Neighbours, Society Murders and The Doctor Blake Mysteries. For nine years he performed the role of Inspector Falcon Price on the drama series Blue Heelers, for which he is best known.

Pigot featured in a number of Australian films, including Head On, Lucky Country, Red Dog, The Dish, Oranges and Sunshine and Blessed.

Pigot is also a documentary writer and presenter who specialises in Australian military history.

In 1994, he completed his first work of non-fiction, The Changi Diary. He also recorded an album The Changi Songbook, a compilation of original songs written by an Australian POW in a Changi POW Camp with the remaining members of the Changi Concert Party in that same year. A live album of the songs was recorded during two concerts at the Melbourne Recital Centre in 2013.

Pigot lived and worked in many Australian cities and in the UK, before returning to the place of his birth in 1995.^{[citation needed]}

In 2001 he married his longtime partner Rachel Mackie, an academic. The couple divorced in 2016. He later remarried and was living in Broken Hill in 2023.^[2]

Pigot has been open about suffering from Bipolar disorder, depression, anxiety, and alcoholism, and having attempted suicide. He spent time in mental and rehab facilities for treatment in 2016.^[3][4]