Amelia Bullmore

Amelia Mary Bullmore, born on 31 January 1964 in Chelsea, London, is an English actress, screenwriter, and playwright. The daughter of advertising executive Jeremy Bullmore and gardening writer Pamela Bullmore, she studied drama at Manchester University. She has two older brothers, including Edward Bullmore.

Bullmore's early career took shape in Manchester, where she was part of a cabaret group called Red Stockings alongside Helen Edmundson. A casting director who saw her perform at the Contact Theatre there led to her being cast as Steph Barnes in the long-running soap opera Coronation Street. She held a regular position on the show from February 1990 to September 1991, with brief returns in April 1992 and September 1995. She lived and worked in Manchester for a decade before relocating to London in 1995.

Her television work spans several notable British productions. She appeared in the first series of the BBC comedy Big Train in 1998, and in 2002 played Sonja, the Ukrainian girlfriend of Alan Partridge, opposite Steve Coogan in the second series of I'm Alan Partridge. From 2008 to 2009 she appeared in Ashes to Ashes, and from 2011 to 2012 in Twenty Twelve. Between 2011 and 2014 she co-starred in the crime drama Scott & Bailey, for which she also wrote seven episodes. In 2016 she starred in the second series of Happy Valley as Vicky Fleming.

In 2009, Bullmore made her Broadway debut as part of the ensemble cast of The Norman Conquests, Alan Ayckbourn's trilogy of interconnected plays. She appeared in all three productions: Round and Round the Garden, Living Together, and Table Manners. The ensemble received the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Ensemble Performance in 2009 for that work.

Bullmore began writing in 1994, contributing to television series including This Life, Attachments, Black Cab, and Scott & Bailey. Her first stage play, Mammals, was written in 2005, staged at the Bush Theatre, and subsequently toured the United Kingdom. In 2007 she produced a new translation of Ibsen's Ghosts, published by Methuen Drama. Her second play, Di and Viv and Rose, was written in 2013 and staged at Hampstead Theatre before transferring to the West End's Vaudeville Theatre in early 2015, where it ran until March of that year. Her radio writing includes multiple series of the BBC Radio 4 drama Craven, which she created and wrote between 2009 and 2014, as well as the radio plays The Bat Man and The Middle, both from 2009.

Bullmore married Scottish actor Paul Higgins in 1993. The two met in Manchester in 1992 while performing A View from the Bridge. They have two daughters.