The first winner in the RTS Scotland’s new category of Writer was Lorna Martin, for Women on the Verge. The show is based on Lorna’s best-selling book Woman on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, which in turn was based on her much loved Grazia column Conversations With My Therapist.

Kerry Condon (Three Billboards, Rome, Better Call Saul), Nina Sosanya (Marcella, W1A, Last Tango in Halifax) and Eileen Walsh (Catastrophe, Patrick Melrose) star in the series which tells the darkly comic tale of three career-driven friends in their 30’s, at various stages of their lives, who share the same nagging concern – that whilst their friends and colleagues seem to be increasingly in control of their lives, their own lives seem to be moving in the opposite direction. It aired on W in the UK and RTÉ2 in Ireland late 2018. The project was picked up in 2011 by Sharon Horgan, who worked with Lorna to develop the series. It was directed by Annie Griffin and produced by Gavin O’Grady. Women on the Verge was also nominated for Best Comedy and Best of Multichannel at the 2019 Broadcasting Press Guild Awards.

Kerry Condon, Eileen Walsh and Nina Sosanya in Women on the Verge

The winner of the Director award was Simon Hynd, for There She Goes. There She Goes is about a severely learning disabled 9-year-old girl Rosie (Miley Locke), her dad Simon (David Tennant), mum Emily (Jessica Hynes) and brother Ben (Edan Hayhurst). All the stories and characters are drawn from the real life experience of writer Shaun Pye, whose daughter was born in 2006 with an extremely rare and, to date, undiagnosed chromosomal disorder. There She Goes aired in late 2018 on BBC Four and was distributed internationally by Sky Vision. You can still watch it on BBC iPlayer in the UK and BritBox in the US and Canada. The series was produced by Clelia Mountford.

There She Goes has also been nominated for Best Comedy at the 2019 TV Choice Awards and Comedy Series at the 2019 Rockie Awards. Jessica Hynes won the 2019 BAFTA TV Award for There She Goes in the category of Best Performance in a Comedy. Her winning speech can be viewed here.

For both shows Sharon Horgan and Clelia Mountford served as Executive Producers.

Miley Locke and David Tennant in There She Goes