Steven Moffat

Steven William Moffat (born 18 November 1961) is a Scottish television writer, television producer and screenwriter.

In the 1980s he wrote a play entitled War Zones (performed at the 1985 Glasgow Mayfest and the Edinburgh Festival Fringe ) and a musical called Knifer.

He is an atheist.

Moffat's father Bill was a head teacher at Thorn Primary School in Johnstone, Renfrewshire; when the school was used for Harry Secombe's Highway in the late 1980s, Bill mentioned to the producers that he had an idea for a television series about a school newspaper.

The producers asked for a sample script, to which Bill agreed on the condition his son Steven write it.

Producer Sandra Hastie said that it was "the best ever first script" that she had read.

The resulting series was titled Press Gang, starring Julia Sawalha and Dexter Fletcher, and it ran for five series on ITV between 1989 and 1993, with Moffat writing all forty-three episodes.

The programme won a BAFTA award in its second series.

During production of the second series of Press Gang, Moffat was experiencing an unhappy personal life as a result of the break-up of his first marriage.

The producer was secretly phoning his friends at home to check on his state.

His wife's new lover was represented in the episode "The Big Finish?"

by the character Brian Magboy (Simon Schatzberger), a name inspired by Brian: Maggie's boy.

Moffat brought in the character so that all sorts of unfortunate things would happen to him, such as having a typewriter dropped on his foot.

Later in the 1990s, he wrote Chalk, inspired by his own experience as an English teacher.

By 1990, Moffat had written two series of Press Gang, but the programme's high cost along with organisational changes at backers Central Independent Television cast its future in doubt.

As Moffat wondered what to do next and worried about his future employment, Bob Spiers, Press Gang's primary director, suggested that he meet with producer Andre Ptaszynski to discuss writing a sitcom.

Inspired by his experience working in education, Moffat's initial proposal was a programme similar to what became Chalk, a sitcom set in a school that eventually aired in 1997.

Moffat, a lifelong fan of Doctor Who, wrote the comedic sketch episode The Curse of Fatal Death for the Comic Relief charity telethon, which aired in early 1999.

His early-2000s sitcom Coupling was based upon the development of his relationship with television producer Sue Vertue.

In March 2004, Moffat was announced as one of the writers for the revived Doctor Who TV series.

He is best known for his work as the second showrunner and head writer of the 2005 revival of the BBC sci-fi television series Doctor Who (2010–2017) and co-creating and co-writing the contemporary crime drama television series Sherlock, based on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories (2010–2017).

He wrote six episodes under executive producer Russell T Davies, which aired from 2005 to 2008.

Moffat's scripts during this era won him three Hugo Awards, a BAFTA Craft Award, and a BAFTA Cymru Award.

Between episodes, he wrote and produced the modern-day drama series Jekyll, based on the novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.

In May 2008, it was announced that Moffat would succeed Davies as showrunner, lead writer and executive producer of Doctor Who.

Around the same time, he dropped his contract with film director Steven Spielberg for a film trilogy based on artist Hergé's character Tintin.

Production on Sherlock's unaired pilot episode began in January 2009, while series 5 of Doctor Who—Moffat's first series as executive producer—began production the following July.

Moffat won another Hugo for his writing as a Doctor Who showrunner, while his work as a Sherlock showrunner won him a BAFTA Craft Award and two Primetime Emmy Awards.

Part of the lone script he wrote was used in Spielberg's film The Adventures of Tintin, eventually released in 2011.

In the 2015 Birthday Honours, Moffat was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for his services to drama.

Born in Paisley, Scotland, Moffat, the son of a teacher, was formerly a teacher himself.

His first television work was the teen drama series Press Gang.

His first sitcom, Joking Apart, was inspired by the breakdown of his first marriage.

In January 2016, Moffat announced he would be stepping down from running Doctor Who after six series.

Sherlock's fourth and most recent series aired in January 2017.

Moffat's last Doctor Who episode, "Twice Upon a Time", aired at Christmas in 2017.

In March 2019, Moffat began production on Dracula, based on Bram Stoker's novel, which was commissioned by BBC One and Netflix and was first broadcast on BBC One in January 2020.

Moffat was born in Paisley, Scotland, where he attended Camphill High School.

He studied at the University of Glasgow, where he was involved with the student television station Glasgow University Student Television.

After gaining a Master of Arts degree in English from Glasgow, he worked as a teacher for three and a half years at Cowdenknowes High School, Greenock.