Ol Parker

Ol Parker (birthname: Oliver Parker) is a successful British writer-director of well-received entertainment. Parker’s feature debut was as the screenwriter of the U.K. crime comedy, It Was an Accident (2000), starring Chiwetel Ejiofor and Thandiwe Newton, and co-produced via Pathe Pictures and Canal Plus. Parker stayed with the comedy mode for his writing-directing feature debut, Imagine Me & You (2005), a U.K.-German production released by Fox Searchlight Pictures, and starring Piper Perabo, Lena Headey, Matthew Goode, and Anthony Head.

In 2011, Parker enjoyed his first major hit as a screenwriter of the frothy British rom-com directed by John Madden, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, which he adapted from Deborah Moggach’s novel, These Foolish Things, and starred Judi Dench, Bill Nighy, Dev Patel, Tom Wilkinson, and Maggie Smith.

The unexpected comedy hit earned $137 million at the worldwide box office. Parker then adapted Jenny Downham’s novel, Before I Die, for the screen version, Now Is Good (2012), which he also directed, with Dakota Fanning, Jeremy Irvine, Paddy Considine, and Olivia Williams.

Ol Parker wrote the sequel, The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (2015), also directed by John Madden, and again starring Dench, Smith, Patel, and Nighy, with new cast members David Strathairn and Richard Gere. Three years later, Parker enjoyed his biggest box-office success as writer-director of the Mamma Mia! sequel, Mamma Mia!

Here We Go Again (2018), with Meryl Streep, Cher, Christine Baranski, Pierce Brosnan, Dominic Cooper, Colin Firth, Andy Garcia, Lily James, Amanda Seyfried, Stellan Skarsgård, and Julie Walters, earning $402 million at the global box office.

Once again adapting a novel as a screenwriter, Ol Parker wrote the script for A Boy Called Christmas (2021), based on Matt (The Midnight Library) Haig’s beloved book of the same title, directed by Gil Kenan, with a cast including Henry Lawful, Toby Jones, Sally Hawkins, Kristen Wiig, Jim Broadbent, and Maggie Smith. Parker returned as writer-director to frothy rom-com mode in 2022, with Universal Pictures’ Ticket to Paradise, starring George Clooney and Julia Roberts.