'The King's Speech' writer David Seidler dies aged 86

The King’s Speech screenwriter David Seidler has died aged 86.

London-born Seidler had a stammer, as had King George VI, the subject of his Bafta and Oscar-winning 2010 feature, produced by See-Saw Films and Bedlam Productions and directed by Tom Hooper, with Colin Firth playing the future king. Seidler won the Oscar and Bafta for best original screenplay.

A stage adaptation of the film opened in the West End in 2012, also written by Seidler.

According to reports, Seidler died while on a fly fishing trip in New Zealand.

“David was in the place he loved most in the world – New Zealand – doing what gave him the greatest peace, which was fly fishing,” Seidler’s manager Jeff Aghassi told BBC News. “If given the chance, it is exactly as he would have scripted it.”

He won his first Writers Guild award for the 1988 biopic Onassis: The Richest Man In The World, starring Raul Julia as Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis. He also cowrote Francis Ford Coppola’s 1988 comedy drama Tucker: The Man And His Dream.

Seidler is survived by two children.