After studying at the University Of Sussex and the National Film and Television School in Beaconsfield in the 1980s, Pharoah played rugby for Wimbledon and began his television writing career on the BBC soap opera EastEnders in 1991, on which he worked for four years and where he met co-writer Matthew Graham. He went on in 1994 – 1995 to contribute five episodes to the popular BBC One drama series Casualty and four episodes to Silent Witness (1996).