Paula Milne, one of Britain's leading screenwriters, left school just before her fifteenth birthday, with no academic qualifications. She studied fine art at the Central School of Art and Design as well as film-making at the Royal College of Art. Her career in television began as a script reader at ATV, followed by two years at the BBC as script reader in the series department where she created and devised "Angels" (1975). Among her numerous original dramas is the critically lauded "Die Kinder" (1990), a six part political thriller for the BBC which starred Frederic Forrest and Miranda Richardson and "Driving Ambition" (1984). Her television plays include _"Play for Today" (1970)_ {A Sudden Wrench}, "Play for Today" (1970) John David, and Queen of Hearts (1989) and CQ for Channel Four. Her films for the BBC include "Screen Two: Frankie and Johnnie (#2.4)" (1986) directed by Martin Campbell which was followed by her highly popular detective series "Chandler & Co" (1994), which the Daily Telegraph declared was, "a splendidly irresistible drama series." Her work with Channel Four has been phenomenally successful. "The Politician's Wife" (1995), her three-part drama series starring Juliet Stevenson and Trevor Eve , won her an enviable clutch of award s including an Emmy award , the BAFTA award for Best Drama Serial, the Annual Writers' Guild Award for Best Original Serial, the Original Creativity Award from Women in Film and Television, the Best Independent Production award and the prestigious George Peabody Award in the United States. She then went on to write the highly acclaimed "The Fragile Heart" (1996), a powerful serial tackling medical ethics starring Nigel Hawthorne . It, too, received many nominations and scooped prestigious BAFTA and BANFF award s. In 1999, Paula created and wrote Second Sight (1999) (TV), starring Clive Owen as a detective progressively going blind, who uses his strange hallucinations to help solve a homicide case. The mini series aired on Sunday nights on BBC 1 and a six hour series has been produced based on Paula's scripts and concept and was transmitted in January/Feb of 2001. Paula has also written a four hour thriller mystery for ITV called Thursday the 12th (2003) (TV). This serial is to be transmitted on the ITV later this year. In the early 1980s, Paula was part of a cultural delegation which visited Central America, in particular Nicaragua and Honduras. Later she spent some time in the Brazilian rain forests researching a feature film. Paula's first three feature films have been made. Mad Love (1995), a road movie starring Drew Barrymore and 'Chris O'Donnell', was followed by the critically successful Hollow Reed (1996), which led Variety to comment, "One cannot be unmoved by the pain at the story's centre, especially when it's caused by good intentions." The film scooped the Prix de Publique at the Dinard Film Festival. Paula also wrote I Dreamed of Africa (2000), which was shot in Africa and stars Kim Basinger , directed by Hugh Hudson . Paula has also written a script for Tom Cruise , a Cruise/Wagner/Paramount production, entitled "BoltFlash." Other Hollywood projects include her adaptation of Daphne Du Maurier 's "My Cousin Rachel" (1983) for Fox 2000. She has just completed a feature film for Warner Brothers in Hollywood, based on her mini series Second Sight (1989), with Brad Silberling to direct ( City of Angels (1998)) and Gary Levinsohn to produce ( Saving Private Ryan (1998)). She is currently writing a screenplay based Anne Robinson's autobiography, "Memoirs of An Unfit Mother," for Tiger Aspect/BBC. Paul Greengrass is producing.