In the late 1980s, he appeared in The Comedy Company and developed several popular characters, a few of which survived beyond The Comedy Company. One of his characters, Col'n Carpenter, is a slow Australian with unique speech mannerisms. Col'n went on to have his own sitcom that ran for two seasons, in the early 1990s. Also in the early 1990s, Gyngell appeared in a series of public service announcements for the Alcohol Advisory Council of New Zealand. Gyngell was a regular on the popular Australian series Full Frontal during the mid-1990s, where he starred alongside Eric Bana before Bana attained Hollywood fame. His most notable characters included; "Leon" ; and as characters sending up Kerry O'Brien and John Laws. Once he left Full Frontal, he had a few guest roles, including comedy programs The Micallef Program and Pizza, and on drama series The Secret Life of Us, CrashBurn and Love My Way. Since 2007, Gyngell played Father Harris on the ABC comedy The Librarians. In 2008, Gyngell had a role in Underbelly for the Nine Network and also in ABC1's comedy Very Small Business. In 2010, he had a role in the TV series Lowdown. In 2012, Gyngell played Paddy the Montebello family's shady accountant in The Straits. Both aired on ABC1.
Film
In 1985, Gyngell starred in his first film Wills & Burke playing William John Wills. In 1988, he played Ian McKenzie in Boulevard of Broken Dreams, which earned him an AFI award for Best actor. In 1988, he appeared in Bachelor Girl and in Grievous Bodily Harm. In 1990, he was in What the Moon Saw, and starred in Heaven Tonight which earned him an AFI nomination. In 2000, he starred in the surprise hit of the year, in the comedy The Wog Boy, playing the Supervisor; In 2002, he played the character of Paul in The Hard Word and as Richard in Blow. In 2005, he was in The Writer.
Film awards
Gyngell received an AFI award in 1988 for "Best Actor in a Supporting Role" for his role in Boulevard of Broken Dreams which starred John Waters who won the AFI Best Actor award; Gyngell was also nominated for his performance in Heaven Tonight. In 2005 Gyngell won the Best Actor award at the St Kilda Film Festival for his role in The Writer.
Theatre
Gyngell played with various theatre collectives in the early 1970s, such as La Mama, The Pram Factory, Hoopla. In the late 1970s, he performed with the Sydney Theatre Company. In 2003, Gyngell played Robert in a production of David Auburn's play Proof. In 2008 Gyngell played William in the two-handerNinety by Joanna Murray-Smith at the Melbourne Theatre Company ; Later that year he played Tartuffe in Molière's The Hypocrite at the MTC opposite Marina Prior and Garry McDonald. In 2012, Gyngell performed in Sydney Theatre Company's production of Pygmalion.
Gyngell played keyboards in the Melbourne band Le Club Foote, who released their only album Cinema Qua in 1984, along with a couple of singles. The album was produced by Colin Hay of the band Men at Work.
