News

In 2025, Jingan was named as one of the writers on the green-lit BBC legal thriller Counsels produced by Balloon Entertainment and BBC Scotland. She will be writing Episode 4 of the series and was part of the original writersroom.

Production begins on Red Eye Series 2 with Jingan returning to write Episode 3.

In 2024, she was selected as a  Broadcast Now Hotshot featured both online and in the June print edition of  Broadcast magazine.

About

Dr. Jingan Young (Yang Jing’an 楊靜安)  is a Hong Kong-born, naturalised British screenwriter, academic, and journalist. She works across film, television, and theatre.

In 2025, Jingan was named one of the writers for the green-lit BBC legal thriller  Counsels produced by Balloon Entertainment and BBC Scotland. She will be writing Episode 4 of the series and was part of the original writers' room.​

In 2024 she was selected as a  Broadcast Now Hotshot  2024 featured in both the online announcement and the June print edition of Broadcast magazine.​

Her debut feature film Number 2 Daughter is currently in development with Bona Dea Films and the British Film Institute (BFI). She is also co-creator and writer of TRIADS a crime series in development with Carnival Films. Additional projects include a locked-room thriller with West Road Pictures and an action romantic comedy with Insight Management & Production.​

In 2024, Jingan wrote Episode 4 of the ITV thriller  Red Eye created by Pete Dowling and produced by Bad Wolf and Sony Pictures Television, starring Richard Armitage, Lesley Sharp, and Jing Lusi. She also served as a story consultant on the series. Jingan is currently writing for Red Eye Series 2 (episode 3), scheduled to begin filming in early 2025.

She is also an academic (PhD, King's College London) and is currently a guest lecturer at the London Film Academy. and King's College London. The second edition of her book Soho on Screen with a foreword by Peter Bradshaw, was published in paperback in February 2025.​

She currently lives in London with her husband and son.

Jingan is represented by Nick Fenwick at Curtis Brown .​

Stage & Screen

In 2025, she was announced as one of the guest writers on the BBC legal thriller  Counsels produced by Balloon Entertainment and BBC Scotland. She was also part of the original writersroom.

Jingan wrote Episode 4 of the ITV thriller  Red Eye created by Pete Dowling and produced by Sony International and Bad Wolf. The hit series stars Richard Armitage and Jing Lusi and premiered on ITV1 on Sunday 21 April 2024, with all episodes available to stream on ITVX. Jingan also served as a story consultant on the show and is currently contributing an episode for Series 2, which films in early 2025. Jingan is also the co-creator of Triads, a new crime series in development with Carnival Films (script commission), and is developing Benching, a tech sitcom with Insight Management & Production. She is also developing a locked-room thriller with West Road Pictures.

Her debut feature film,  Number Two Daughter  — a British East Asian romantic comedy — was developed through BBC Writersroom and was the winner of the Triforce Events Script Search Competition in 2020 with Greenacre Films. It is currently in development with Bona Dea Films and the British Film Institute (BFI).

She was named a  Broadcast Now Hotshot 2024 and was previously selected by the BBC and Idris Elba as ‘one to watch’ on the  BBC Talent Hotlist 2017 . She has won awards from Netflix and the Society of Literature. She has writing credits on Biff and Chip for CBBC/BBC Kids. She is a member of  BAFTA Connect  and  EAST TV Network .

Jingan was the first playwright commissioned in English for FILTH (Failed in London, Try Hong Kong) which premiered at the 42nd Hong Kong Arts Festival in 2014. From 2014–2018, she produced the sold-out Foreign Goods showcases at Theatre503, the Park Theatre, and the Arcola, culminating in the publication of the  Foreign Goods  anthology (published by Bloomsbury). Her play Life and Death of a Journalist received critical acclaim at VAULT Festival 2020 — The Guardian called it “intensely smart… prickling with intelligence and anger.” In 2023, her play Hong Kong Tragedy was shortlisted for the Jermyn Street Theatre Woven Voices Prize. She was also selected for the  Sky Comedy x Birmingham Rep Scheme  in 2022.

She has been in writersrooms with Bad Wolf, Balloon, Channel 4, and CBBC/BBC Kids. In 2021, she completed the highly competitive  Channel 4 Screenwriting Course , selected as one of 12 writers from over 3,000 submissions. She trained with BBC Writersroom’s invitation-only  London Voices  scheme, and is a graduate of the  Royal Court Young Writers Programme  (2012),  Hampstead Theatre’s Heat & Light  (2012), and  Soho Theatre Writers Lab  (2013).

Her plays have been staged at the Arcola Theatre, Theatre503, Hong Kong Arts Festival, Pleasance Theatre, Old Vic, VAULT Festival, Jacksons Lane, Old Red Lion, New Wimbledon Theatre, and Camden People’s Theatre. Her radio plays have been produced by Roundhouse Radio (Camden), and she is currently developing a new radio play idea with director Shan Ng.

Jingan is also working on her debut novel.

She is represented by Nick Fenwick at Curtis Brown

Awards

  • Broadcast Now Hot Shot

    2024

  • Netflix Arts Fund

    2020 & 2021

  • Society of Authors Fund

    2020 & 2021

  • Winner of Triforce Events Competition with Greenacre Films

    2020

  • Women of the Future Award (Commendation)

    2018

  • Idris Elba/BBC Talent Hotlist

    2017

  • Peggy Ramsay Foundation Award

    2016

  • Michael Grandage Company Futures Fund

    2016

  • Hong Kong Arts and Development Fund

    2014

Training

  • Channel 4 Screenwriting Scheme

    2021 & 22

  • Sky Studios Comedy Scheme

    2021 & 22

  • BBC Writersroom BAME Script Editing Scheme

    2016

  • Park Theatre Script Accelerator

    2014

  • Soho Theatre’s Writers Lab

    2013

  • Royal Court Young Writers Programme

    2011

  • Hampstead Theatre’s Heat & Light Programme

    2011

Research

Jingan holds a BA (Hons) in English and Film Studies from King’s College London, a Master’s in Creative Writing from Oxford University and a PhD in Film Studies from King's College London. At 17, she completed a Foundation in Art at Parsons School of Design.

She is currently a guest lecturer at the London Film Academy and supervises BA and MA dissertations in the Department of Digital Humanities at King’s College London. From 2022 to 2023, she convened the  Introduction to Screenwriting module in the School of Arts at Birkbeck, University of London, where she also lectured across multiple screen and media modules. She has previously taught at Brunel University and held teaching and research roles across the Departments of Film Studies and CMCI at King’s, including within King’s Academy, where she assessed Global Talent Awards. She regularly delivers workshops and continues to mentor emerging writers across various institutions.​

Her first academic monograph,  Soho on Screen: Cinematic Spaces of Bohemia and Cosmopolitanism, 1948-1963 (Berghahn Books), with a foreword by Peter Bradshaw, was published in hardback in May 2022 and in paperback in February 2025. The book was featured on  BBC Radio 3’s  Free Thinking  with Dr. Matthew Sweet (May 2021), and she delivered an invited lecture at BFI Southbank for the  New Writings  series (June 2023). Her second monograph is currently under peer review. Most recently, her chapter on Emeric Pressburger was published in  Global London on Screen (Manchester University Press).

She has presented at numerous international conferences and is published in several peer-reviewed journals. Her broader public engagement includes appearances on the  Soho Bites Cities in Cinema , and  Soho on Screen  podcasts (produced by Dom Delargy). In 2020, she founded the  Cities in Cinema  network.

As a journalist and critic, Jingan is a regular contributor to  The Guardian Sight and Sound , Nylon Magazine South China Morning Post and the  London Review of Books . She has previously worked as an editorial intern at  British Vogue  and  The Guardian ’s Books section.​

Broadcasting

Jingan has appeared on BBC World News, BBC Radio 4 Today, ABC Radio, London Live,  BBC Radio 4 Front Row and BBC 3 Free Thinking with Matthew Sweet. She created the original Soho Bites podcast and the new season is now hosted and produced by Dom Delargy. Original and new episodes can be found on all podcast platforms. 

Jingan’s new guest-led podcast  The Days of Being Wild Podcast  阿飛正傳, on Hong Kong, launches soon.

She is available for presenting and research requests.

Contact