Abi Morgan

Honorary graduates 2015-16

Abi Morgan (DLitt)

Tuesday 14 July 3:00pm

Abi Morgan is a critically acclaimed British playwright and screenwriter, noted for her works for television and as the screenwriter of a number of contemporary British films, including The Iron Lady. Her work on The Iron Lady earned her a BAFTA Award for Best Original Screenplay.

The daughter of actress Pat England and theatre director Gareth Morgan, she decided to become a writer whilst studying English and Drama at the University of Exeter, going on to undertake a postgraduate writing course at the Central School of Speech and Drama.

She began her writing career within the theatre and in 2002 was nominated as ‘most promising playwright’ at the Lawrence Olivier Awards for her play Tender at the Hampstead Theatre. Abi was then commissioned to write human trafficking drama Sex Traffic (2004) for Channel 4 which went on to win Best Drama at the 2005 BAFTA Awards.

She has written a number of single dramas for television including Tsunami: The Aftermath (2006) and Royal Wedding (2010). Her first continuing drama series The Hour (2011) was set in a BBC newsroom during the Suez crisis and was commissioned for a second series. She wrote the screenplay for the Margaret Thatcher biopic, The Iron Lady (2011), which starred Meryl Streep in the lead role. Her BBC adaptation of Sebastian Faulks’ Birdsong was broadcast to critical acclaim in January 2012.