Biography

Joanne Thomson is an Actor, Writer and Director from Glasgow, Scotland.

Since graduating with a BA in Acting from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland she has also trained with the Groundlings Improv School in Los Angeles and the National Film and Television School on John Yorke's TV Writer's Academy. She has worked extensively across the UK as an actor and has directed internationally award-winning theatre.

Her theatre credits as an actor include work with the National Theatre of Scotland, Bristol Old Vic, Citizens Theatre, Birmingham Rep, Royal Lyceum, Traverse and the legendary Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester.

In 2022 it was announced that Joanne had been cast as new recurring character Amy McCallum in OUTLANDER with Sony/Starz before going on to join the cast of Synchronicity and CAA's latest feature film Kill. Prior to this, she played DS Lisa Harvey in BBC One's BAFTA-nominated drama THE VICTIM, and her performance in ITV's BAFTA-nominated In Plain Sight won her 2 Best Actress nominations at the IARA awards. In 2019, she starred in BBC's prime-time drama THE SUFFRAGETTES which won a BAFTA that same year. In 2021 Joanne was selected as a BAFTA Los Angeles Newcomer in addition to being chosen for Glasgow Film Festival's New Talent scheme as a Writer/Director. Most recently she was chosen as one of the Traverse Theatre's Breakthrough Writers.

Her passion lies in championing underrepresented voices and her writing has placed in several Screencraft competitions, made the BBC Writer's Room Top 2% List, Olivia Colman's South of the River & Sister's Commendation List and won Moonshot's LA-based Pilot Accelerator in association with Netflix & HBO.

Her queer, women-led pilot Spinner & Marie also won C21's coveted Screenwriting Award at Content London in 2021 and her short film, On the Twelfth Day of Findom which she will also co-direct, was recently shortlisted for BFI-funding and will go into production in 2024 Exec Produced by Blazing Griffin. Having co-written and starred in 48h film Flat 2/2 (nominated for 8 awards including Best Film and Best Writing), she was since brought on to write the musical short film Glasgow Town for Blazing Griffin starring Taggart's Blythe Duff and directed by BAFTA-winning director Michael J Ferns.

Her debut play Jack in a Box was long-listed for Theatre 503's International Playwriting Award, shortlisted for the St Andrews Playwriting Award, and was chosen for The Royal Shakespeare Company's 37 Plays project.