Instead of starting out with a script, the director begins with a theme, assembles a group of actors and then undergoes a lengthy rehearsal process, enabling characters to be realized and a script to organically develop. Leigh's approach to film-making perhaps came as a result of his early work in theatre. The director studied as an actor at RADA (1960-62) before attending the Camberwell and Central Art Colleges, followed by the London Film School. He then worked in the theatre, with achievements including the original six-hour production of Little Malcom and His Struggle Against the Eunuchs (1965).
Successfully moving to television, the director began to create accurately observant improvised texts which examined the everyday lives of working class and lower-middle class British characters, exploring their aspirations, value systems and feelings of loneliness or despair. These themes continue to be common in the films of Leigh.
After creating a number of successful BBC Plays for Today, which included Nuts in May (1976) and Abigail's Party (1977), he made his cinema debut with Bleak Moments (1971), an account of a secretary's bleak existence and the lives of those around her.
The directors next feature film was High Hopes (1988), a story of a young couple and their rejections of the values of the Thatcher era.
The conflicts and emotional concerns of a typical working-class family were explored in the film Life is Sweet (1990).
Leigh received the best director award at Cannes for Naked (1993), in which Johnny, played by David Thewlis, wanders around London, spouting a rant of urban alienation to the various characters he meets along the way.
The director won a Palm D'Or for Secrets and Lies (1996), a tale of an adopted black woman's search through London for her real mother.
Career Girls (1997), told a tale of two young women who reunite and rekindle their friendship after having said goodbye at their college graduation, six years earlier.
His 1999 film Topsy Turvy was based around the first performance of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado. Far from being a traditional biopic or musical though, the film - which won best film and best director at the New York Critics Circle awards - manages to capture the details of a real world filled with real lives.
By placing such importance on character development, Leigh creates worlds which we believe could continue to exist beyond the scenes on the screen. His stories are filled with sensitivity, realism and humour.
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