David Morrissey started acting at Everyman's Youth Theatre in Liverpool, where he was born and raised. He made his debut at 16 in One Summer, a series about two Liverpool runaways. Following completion of RADA studies, he was with the Royal Shakespeare Company for two years. then at the National Theatre. Along the way, he also worked at Cheek By Jowl, Manchester Royal Exchange and other venues. He most recently appeared at the Donmar Warehouse in Three Days of Rain, directed by Robin Lefevre.

Until now, moviegoers may know him best as the compromised husband in Hilary and Jackie, though he is sure to surprise them in his new film about the salsa scene in London, Born Romantic. In Some Voices, directed by Simon Callow Jones, he plays a man looking after his mentally ill brother, and in The Suicide Club (with Jonathan Pryce) he re-enacts a Victorian ritual.

Morrissey appeared in Peter Greenaway' s Drowning By Numbers, John Irving's Robin Hood, Stephen Gyllenhaal's Waterland and Bill Forsyth's Being Human. He has appeared in numerous BBC productions, two of the more prominent being Pure Wickedness and Our Mutual Friend, a Dickens adaptation. He worked previously with Madden in The Widow Maker and in Theseus and the Minotaur, an episode for the Jim Hensen series, The Greek Myths.

Morrissey has directed two short films, A Secret Audience, about Napoleon, and Bring Me Your Love, adapted from a Charles Bukowski short story. He has just directed a television mini-series for the BBC, and next year will direct his first feature. The Wild, adapted from the novel by Esther Freud, who is his wife.