MIKE NEWELL

Newell was born in St Albans, Hertfordshire, the son of amateur actors. Newell was educated at St Albans School and Magdalene College, Cambridge. He then attended a three-year training course at Granada Television, with the intention of entering the theatre.
Newell directed various British TV shows from the 1960s onwards (such as Spindoe, credited as Cormac Newell, and Big Breadwinner Hog), but eventually shifted his focus to film direction.
His first feature-length project was The Man in the Iron Mask (1977), a made-for-television film. His first critically acclaimed movie was Bad Blood (1982), concerning the 1941 manhunt for the New Zealand mass-killer, Stan Graham, played by Jack Thompson. This was followed by Dance with a Stranger (1985), a biographical drama starring Miranda Richardson as Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in Great Britain. For his directorial efforts, Newell won the Award of the Youth at the 1985 Cannes Film Festival.
Newell continued his successes in the film industry with Enchanted April (1992), an adaptation of the 1922 novel by Elizabeth von Arnim. Miranda Richardson received a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Comedy/Musical and Joan Plowright won a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy/Musical.
During this period, George Lucas recruited Newell as one of the numerous feature film directors to direct episodes of The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles.