John K. Emery, better known by his professional name of Jack Emery, is a British director, writer and producer for stage, TV and radio. He was born in 1944 and educated at

Keele University Keele University is a Public university#United Kingdom, public research university in Keele, approximately from Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, England. Founded in 1949 as the University College of North Staffordshire, it was granted uni ...

. He began his career producing and acting at Keele, most notably in his first one-man show taken from the novels and plays of

Samuel Beckett Samuel Barclay Beckett (; 13 April 1906 – 22 December 1989) was an Irish writer of novels, plays, short stories, and poems. Writing in both English and French, his literary and theatrical work features bleak, impersonal, and Tragicomedy, tra ...

, called ''A Remnant'', which played in the West End, the

Edinburgh Festival __NOTOC__ This is a list of Arts festival, arts and cultural festivals regularly taking place in Edinburgh, Scotland. The city has become known for its festivals since the establishment in 1947 of the Edinburgh International Festival and the ...

and toured worldwide. In 1968 Emery recorded an album, featuring extracts from the show, for Saga Psyche label (PSY 30003). Emery/Enery has worked both as a freelance writer and producer, and later produced through his own production company, The Drama House. His production credits include the TV movies ''Witness Against Hitler'' (1996) and ''

Breaking the Code ''Breaking the Code'' is a 1986 British play by Hugh Whitemore about British mathematician Alan Turing, who was a key player in the breaking of the German Enigma code at Bletchley Park during World War II and a pioneer of computer science. Th ...

'', which won the Best Single Drama award at the

Broadcasting Press Guild The Broadcasting Press Guild (BPG) is a British association of journalists dedicated to the topic of general media issues. History The Guild was established in 1974 as a breakaway of The Critics' Circle and celebrated its 50th anniversary in 20 ...

Awards. In 2000 he was awarded an honorary degree of

Doctor of Letters Doctor of Letters (D.Litt., Litt.D., Latin: ' or '), also termed Doctor of Literature in some countries, is a terminal degree in the arts, humanities, and social sciences. In the United States, at universities such as Drew University, the degree ...

by Keele University in recognition of his "body of work, both as original writer and producer, which is distinguished by scholarship and scrupulous research".

Personal life

In 1975 he married English journalist and television presenter

Joan Bakewell Joan Dawson Bakewell, Baroness Bakewell (''née'' Rowlands; born 16 April 1933), is an English journalist, television presenter and Labour Party peer. Baroness Bakewell is president of Birkbeck, University of London; she is also an author and ...

, who was 12 years older than him. The couple divorced in 2001. Bakewell later said, "The age difference did matter, but other things mattered more." In 2004 he married Gillian Emery.

References

External links

Keele Drama: List of All Productions
at keele.ac.uk * * 1944 births Living people Alumni of Keele University British television directors British radio directors British theatre directors Place of birth missing (living people) {{tv-director-stub