Mike Harris is a script writer, dramatist, director, and experienced creative-writing tutor/mentor working both with dramatists and novelists on plot, dialogue, character, structure, plotting and planning.
He has written more than 150 broadcast and performed single-plays, adaptations, series and soap episodes for radio, stage, touring theatre, and TV, as well as animation and a Children’s novel. He has taught script writing at all stages from community workshops and Arvon courses to MA level, and has held writer’s residencies in prisons, schools, The Lemon Tree Arts Centre Aberdeen, and University College Cork. He has led creative writing courses in prose fiction for the British Council in Malaysia and Nigeria. He established and led the Sheffield Hallam University Script writing MA part time for many years.
‘I met Mike while I was studying scriptwriting. I was desperate to write a novel. Mike introduced me to concepts of dramatic structure that I would find essential tools for novel writing, tools that I continue to use today. He opened my eyes to the link between character and plot. Perhaps more importantly, he made me realise that writing is a craft and that it takes hard work. He made me write. Then he made me write it again. And again. He forced me to challenge every decision I made, every turn in the story, every character's motivation, and I know that I'm a better writer for it. I don't know of any mentors who put more effort into helping their students.' – Russ Thomas whose best-selling first novel Firewatching was published in 2020 in the UK and US by Simon and Schuster as part of a ‘two book deal’
'I wrote my very first TV and Radio Drama scripts under Mike’s expert and robust guidance. I sent both to BBC Writer’s Room and they gained me my first TV and Radio Drama commissions at the BBC. I have gone on to write over 20 hours of Radio and TV Drama for the BBC including single plays, series, and adaptations of novels. Mike has continued to support me throughout my career. ' – Sharon Oakes, dramatist.
'…Mike Harris’s adaptation (actually, more of a masterclass in filleting and repurposing) took Trollope’s major characters and plot lines, shook them about, jettisoned everything dispensable, and grippingly refashioned them for the 21st century. ' – Daily Telegraph
