How Michaela Coel Stunned the British TV Industry, Calling Out Racism and Sexism

How Michaela Coel Stunned the British TV Industry, Calling Out Racism and Sexism

As the Edinburgh TV Festival delegates took their seats for the 43rd MacTaggart Lecture, you could hear the murmurs of anticipation. For the first time since these lectures began in 1976, the keynote speaker was young, black and female.

At last the British broadcasting industry was acknowledging the need to address issues of diversity and inclusion from this prestigious platform by inviting a young British comedian from east London to take the floor. As he introduced her, Philip Edgar-Jones from Sky Arts acknowledged that the choice of Michaela Coel “truly breaks new ground, making you wonder what we’ve been doing all these years”.

Over the next 45 minutes Coel gave a brave and challenging talk, presenting a revealing account of her own journey as a young creative talent from an immigrant Ghanaian family in Tower Hamlets. Famous as the award-winning screenwriter, producer and star of the E4 sitcom Chewing Gum, her skin colour, gender, age (just 30), and the relatively short time she has worked in television, all indicate very different credentials that set her apart from her predecessors.