Thomas M. Wright

He co-wrote, directed and produced the feature film Acute Misfortune, released in 2019, based on Sydney journalist Erik Jensen's award-winning biography of Australian artist Adam Cullen, Acute Misfortune: The Life and Death of Adam Cullen. The film received The Age Critics' Prize at Melbourne International Film Festival, where it premiered. It was given a "Notable mention" (along with Sweet Country) in The Monthly Awards 2018, and Screen Daily called it an "Overlooked gem". The film was nominated for the 2019 AACTA Award for Best Independent Film. The Hollywood Reporter called Acute Misfortune "one of the year's most striking and accomplished directorial debuts". It received a five star review in The Guardian, and was later named one of The Guardian's "10 Best Australian Films of the decade 2010-2020" and the best Australian film of 2019 The score, by Evelyn Ida Morris, was nominated for best soundtrack at the 2018 ARIA Music Awards.

In April 2019, during the COVID-19 pandemic in Australia, it was announced that a new film, The Unknown Man, would begin filming in South Australia as soon as enough of the COVID-19 restrictions are lifted. Directed by Wright, it will be produced by and star Joel Edgerton. Sean Harris will play the second lead role. The film was originally announced at Berlin’s European Film Market in February, and will be made by See-Saw Films, with support from Screen Australia and the South Australian Film Corporation.

In 2018 he featured in Warwick Thornton's Sweet Country, which received the Venice Film Festival's Special Jury Prize, the AACTA Award for Best Film and the Toronto Film Festival's Platform Prize.

In 2017 Wright was the subject of an Archibald Prize finalist portrait by Marcus Wills, Antagonist, Protagonist (Thomas M. Wright), with a scene set up to look like a crime drama, with Wright as protagonist.

Wright featured in the film The Man With The Iron Heart (2016), an adaptation of Laurent Binet's Prix Goncourt-winning novel, HHhH, with Jack O'Connell, Rosamund Pike, Stephen Graham and Jason Clarke. He also filmed the Sony / WGN America Series Outsiders in the lead role of Sheriff Wade Houghton for producers Peter Tolan and Paul Giamatti. His performance was cited as the standout of the series by Hollywood Reporter and Variety.

In 2015, Wright played the guide Mike Groom in the feature film Everest, based on the 1996 Mount Everest disaster, in which in which eight climbers were killed and several others were stranded by a storm. He also played the murdered journalist Brian Peters in Balibo (2009), and Thomas Bodenham in Van Diemen's Land.

Wright came to attention of the world as an actor in the Sundance / BBC TV series Top of the Lake in 2013, for which he was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the US Critics' Choice Awards. Regarding his casting as Johnno Mitcham in the series, director Jane Campion compared him to a young Daniel Day-Lewis.

He appeared as cult-figure Steven Linder in the 2013 US adaptation of The Bridge. Executive Producer Elwood Reid said of Wright’s audition for the series: "...it was the best audition I have ever seen. He walked in and the temperature of the room changed".

He has played lead roles for the Malthouse Theatre, Melbourne Theatre Company and Sydney Theatre Company, including the title role Baal in the controversial production commissioned by Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton and directed by Simon Stone in 2011.

Wright created the theatre company Black Lung, also known as The Black Lung Theatre and Whaling Firm, in 2006, with fellow writer and director Thomas Henning (Australian artist). Their first production, Avast, was called "Insanely fast-paced, artfully arrhythmic, meta-theatrical - a breathtaking combination of precision and chaos" by Chris Kohn, writing for Realtime. and hailed as one of the most influential theatre companies of the decade. Under the Black Lung banner, Wright created productions with Adelaide Festival and Darwin Festival, Belvoir, Malthouse Theatre, and Queensland Theatre Co. and Brisbane Festival.

Thomas Michael Wright (born 22 June 1983), also known as Tom Wright or Thomas M. Wright, is an Australian actor, writer, film director and producer. He is the co-founder (2006) and director of theatre company Black Lung, also known as The Black Lung Theatre and Whaling Firm, along with Thomas Henning. As an actor he came to attention in Jane Campion's series Top of the Lake, for which he was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the (US-Canadian) Critics' Choice Awards. He directed the feature film Acute Misfortune (2019) and is set to direct a new thriller starring Joel Edgerton titled The Unknown Man in 2020, as soon as COVID-19 restrictions in Australia are lifted enough.