Mike Leigh

Film director Mike Leigh talks to John Wilson about the art and experiences that have shaped his own creative life. Leigh recalls his early life in Salford and reveals how a life drawing class at art college proved a formative influence on his later film-making career. He discusses his discovery of world cinema in the 1960s and the particular impact of the French New Wave, and explains his unique film-making process in which actors develop roles through improvisation.