Biography

Jimmy McGovern was born in September 1949 in Liverpool, Merseyside, England, UK. He is a writer and producer, known for The Street (2006), Time (2021) and Cracker (1993).

A lot of his work has included characters that have stammers. McGovern himself had a stammer until he was 9 years old and had to have his brother Joey to translate for him.

Left school at sixteen but later went back into higher education and became a teacher in his late twenties.

Is one of 9 children. Siblings are three sisters and five brothers.

'Jimmy McGovern's Cracker: From Tragedy To Sucess A Noir Of The Nineties' by Josephine M Dunn (IMDb Josephine Dunn II) is now available on Amazon as a Kindle e-book ASIN B07BMC583S. It covers the 1st 3 stories in the Cracker series. A paperback will soon be available. Josephine worked with Jimmy & knew Robbie when they lived in the same road in London. Developed from a M.A. dissertation Derby University September 1996. Copies were previously held in the libraries of Derby University and ITV plc (formerly Granada TV) . Josephine was one of the production managers on the BBC film drama "Needle" also written by Jimmy McGovern and subsequently Jimmy, producer Gub Neal and the 3 directors of series I of Cracker (Andy Wilson, Michael Winterbottom, Simon Cellan Jones) gave extensive and exclusive interviews to Josephine for her M.A. dissertation. Robbie Coltrane lived in Southborough Road Hackney as a near neighbour of Josephine and used to visit for whisky & chats.

'Jimmy McGovern's Cracker: From Tragedy To Success A Noir Of The Nineties' by Josephine M Dunn 28/3/2018 ISBN 9-7819-8062-5453 https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/198062545X paperback & also Kindle e-book. Critical work plus exclusive interviews with the creative team.

[on finding out Robbie Coltrane was to be cast as Fitz in Cracker] I was suicidal.....I thought it was the biggest mistake ever made...because I had this thin wiry guy in mind. I was going to walk, I was on the phone to my agent and then the first few rushes came out .... and he was absolutely astounding.

I envy people like Fitz. I envy Robbie Coltrane. There was one night when it was at a Cracker rap party and he had us all in stitches. He was absolutely brilliant, then at the end of the night he played the piano brilliantly too and I hated him.