William McGregor (director)


William McGregor is a British screenwriter and director working in film, television, and commercials.

Career

McGregor studied at University for the Creative Arts in Farnham where he made his 2009 student film, Who's Afraid of the Water Sprite? and won the Royal Television Society Award for Best Drama; the Cambridge Student Film Festival was renamed "The Watersprite Film Festival" in honour of the film.
McGregor was selected as a Screen International "Star of Tomorrow" in 2012 and a Berlinale Talent Campus participant in 2010. McGregor is represented for drama in the UK by Independent Talent and for commercials by The Mill.
McGregor became the youngest-ever director of E4's BAFTA award-winning drama, Misfits, in 2013, directing the first three episodes of series five. In 2014, he directed the finale of the BBC's Poldark. The final episode was described as "one of those rare occasions when a popular drama series delivers something that properly belongs to art" by The Daily Telegraph.
In 2016 McGregor directed the mini series One of Us, starring Juliet Stevenson and Laura Fraser. The four part miniseries was produced by the BBC and Netflix. The series received the highest number of nominations for any television production at the 2017 Scottish Royal Television Society Awards, and actress Juliet Stevenson received a Scottish BAFTA nomination for her work on the show.
In 2019 William directed the This World storyline for the first series of His Dark Materials.

Feature films

McGregor's BAFTA winning debut feature film, Gwen, produced by Hilary Bevan Jones, premièred at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2018.
After the Toronto International Film Festival premiere Gwen was picked up for distribution in the US and internationally . McGregor also signed to the Creative Artists Agency for representation in the US.
The film became one of the Toronto International Film Festival buzz titles drawing praise for its folk horror routes and unnerving tone.

Awards

Short films