Mick Ward, 1st Assistant Director and first amongst equals. Mick broke into the industry. No back-door. No nepotism. He did it ALL from his own determination, work ethic and drive for a better life. He’d come from a loving, but not affluent background - despite the southern-centric industry, he remained a proud Mancunian (more of that later). For the early part of his life, he was someone that had never dreamt he could be running Hollywood shoots at Shepperton Studios. But he did.

In his late 20’s Mick was a labourer - working on rooftops - when he had his film career ‘inciting incident’ — a Ken Loach film was due to film in the area, and Mick talked his way into becoming a runner on Cannes-winning Raining Stones.

Like all of us, Mick fell in love with the film business, and so began his hero’s journey. Underlining his drive, he built his career on films such as I.D., Sense and Sensibility and East is East before stepping up to 2nd AD on Fever Pitch starring Colin Firth.

He was then mentored on Snatch by MARV producers Adam Bohling and Dave Reid, before finding his calling as 1st AD on Duncan Jones’ Moon, Jon Amiel’s Creation and Elaine Constantine’s Northern Soul.

He also found regular collaborations with directors such as Nick Moran and Sacha Bennett, and worked with top tier talent such as Bob Hoskins, Jason Statham, Jenny Agutter and Sam Rockwell.

People loved working with him - not just because he was great at his job - but because he cared about the films he worked on. He really did. Mick used to say “Some people do crosswords, I do schedules.“ As anyone in the industry knows, a schedule that’s 1% wrong can cause 99% of problems.

Mick was the Alan Turing of schedules. Whether it was instinct, or a specific section of his brain, his scheduling was renowned for being bulletproof. Later in his career, he pointed out that he used to be given a script to schedule, and that’s what dictated how many weeks he recommended the shoot should be… But over the last decade he was being given scripts and told how long the shoot would be because of budget. He complained this was the tail-wagging-the-dog, but I think - deep down inside - he relished the chance to see if he could make square-pegs fit round-holes.

Somehow, he did.Along with this instinctive skill, Mick was known for his wit, regaling perfectly timed anecdotes that would finish just as the lighting was ready, or the rain stopped. It was as if he scheduled these moments into the day so he could tell one of his stories before the cast/crew had to tell the actual story that everyone was being paid to create. But his humour wasn’t just for performance, it was also his weapon. Some scream and shout when things go wrong or someone is late to set. Mick’s approach was to make light of it with a perfectly timed joke. It was never bullying - he was not that kind of person - but the punchline was ‘that’ mistake would never be repeated.

It was a respectful way of dealing with situations, and Mick was so highly respected across the board: top-billed star, runner, the owner of that day’s location, whoever. Mick had time for everyone, and yet always seemed to create time to complete the day’s call sheet. He always did.

But perhaps the most important thing to say about this most important professional is this:

He was a nurturer of talent and teacher. But not in a film school. Not selling a ‘How to’ book.Not for personal gain. He just did it.There’s an army of film crew that will put their hand up and say: “I’m here because of Mick Ward.” Being from the north, whenever Mick heard an accent on-set that wasn’t southern, he’d embrace them and give them the confidence that they could believe and achieve.

Beyond that, you’ll find someone on any UK set that will happily agree he opened a door, opened their eyes, opened their up their ambitions.

Because he did.

Why?

So if Mick’s life was a movie, it would be because he was grafting on rooftops before he got into the film industry, and could see the view was better the higher you got up.

Ken Loach should make that film.Mick's Story