Nik Steven

Nik is brilliant but a nightmare to categorize in an age which seeks definitive labels. While most creative people plough a particular furrow, Nik Steven tills a savannah. A label of definition does not exist for him. Which is probably why it has taken so long for him to gain the recognition he most certainly deserves.

Born and educated in England, Nik Steven’s interests have always been wide and varied. As well as playing the clarinet and making short films, he also takes seriously good photographs, casts bronze sculpture, designs theatre sets and writes short stories and film scripts.

After winning a BBC film competition back in the 70’s, at the age of fifteen, he was invited by BBC Bristol to shoot a twenty-minute short under any subject of his choosing, leading one to believe his destiny was set. His father, Anthony Steven, a prolific television writer who co-wrote The Forsyth Saga, had other plans. Eager to avoid paying 90% supertax, he whisked the entire family off to the safety of Malta and then to Italy, where the taxman’s’ grasp was out of reach.
After five years exile, he ran out of cash. The family were rescued by an Italian Countess and air lifted back to England.

Nicholas remained in Italy and moved to Rome where he worked various jobs in film and television as cameraman and photographer, living for a period with the famous American sculptor, Zev, in Trastevere. He was also picked to play a leading role with Marcello Mastroianni in Wife Mistress only to be replaced.
In 1980, Nicholas travelled to Warsaw with the intention of going to Roman Polanski’s film school in Lodz. “In the long term the plan did not work out. Was he cursed with ill fate? Did it have something to do with his uncanny resemblance to the famous director? Rather than capitulate to misery, the countless disasters he amassed during his time there have been turned into a collection of hilarious short stories. (see Naughty Thoughts) Although not all stories were funny. “In Poland, I was probably one of the very few Westerners who witnessed first hand the collapse of Soviet rule. When Martial law was imposed by Russia, I knew it was time to get out.”

Recently, Nicholas adapted three short stories from his memoir, into film scripts. Until the day they get produced, rather than leave them to gather dust on the shelf, he has transcribed them into reader friendly short stories of fiction, currently available on request.