Wilfred Glyn Greatorex (27 May 1921 – 14 October 2002) was an English television and film writer, script editor and producer. He was creator of such series as '' Secret Army'', ''

1990 File:1990 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1990 FIFA World Cup is played in Italy; The Human Genome Project is launched; Voyager I takes the famous Pale Blue Dot image- speaking on the fragility of Humankind, humanity on Earth, Astroph ...

'', ''Plane Makers'' and its sequel ''

The Power Game ''The Plane Makers'' is a British television series created by Wilfred Greatorex and produced by Rex Firkin. ATV made three series for ITV between 1963 and 1965. It was succeeded by ''The Power Game'', which ran for an additional three ser ...

'', ''

Hine ''Hine'' is a surname deriving from Middle English. Etymology According to the '' Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland'', the modern name ''Hine'' and its variants derive from the Middle English word ''hine'' (with the addit ...

'', ''Brett'', ''Man at the Top'', ''Man From Haven'' and ''The Inheritors''. He also wrote the screenplay for the 1969 film ''

Battle of Britain The Battle of Britain, also known as the Air Battle for England (german: die Luftschlacht um England), was a military campaign of the Second World War, in which the Royal Air Force (RAF) and the Fleet Air Arm (FAA) of the Royal Navy defende ...

''. He was described by

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

newspaper as "one of the most prolific and assured of television script-writers and editors from the 1960s into the 1980s". Starting off as a journalist, he got his big break as a TV writer on

Lew Grade Lew Grade, Baron Grade, (born Lev Winogradsky; 25 December 1906 – 13 December 1998) was a British media proprietor and impresario. Originally a dancer, and later a talent agent, Grade's interest in television production began in 1954 ...

's ATV service writing dramas about journalism, such as ''

Deadline Midnight ''-30-'' (released as ''Deadline Midnight'' in the UK) is a 1959 film directed by Jack Webb and starring Webb and William Conrad as night managing editor and night city editor, respectively, of a fictional Los Angeles, California, Los Angeles new ...

'' and ''Front Page Story''. He wrote a number of books, including one about the

Battle of Arnhem The Battle of Arnhem was a battle of the Second World War at the vanguard of the Allied Operation Market Garden. It was fought in and around the Dutch city of Arnhem, the town of Oosterbeek, the villages Wolfheze and Driel and the vicinity fro ...

ghostwriter A ghostwriter is hired to write literary or journalistic works, speeches, or other texts that are officially credited to another person as the author. Celebrities, executives, participants in timely news stories, and political leaders often h ...

for Major General

Roy Urquhart Major General Robert Elliot "Roy" Urquhart, (28 November 1901 – 13 December 1988) was a British Army officer who saw service during the Second World War and Malayan Emergency. He became prominent for his role as General Officer Commanding th ...

. As a TV script editor he also worked on series such as ''

Danger Man ''Danger Man'' (retitled ''Secret Agent'' in the United States for the revived series, and ''Destination Danger'' and ''John Drake'' in other overseas markets) is a British television series that was broadcast between 1960 and 1962, and again b ...

'' and was also creator/producer of ''The Inheritors'', ''Hine'' and ''The Power Game''. Papers discovered at a Norfolk auction house in 2011 reveal that 'Hine' had a budget of £84,000, the equivalent of close to £1m some forty years later. In 1977, he came up with the

dystopian A dystopia (from Ancient Greek δυσ- "bad, hard" and τόπος "place"; alternatively cacotopiaCacotopia (from κακός ''kakos'' "bad") was the term used by Jeremy Bentham in his 1818 Plan of Parliamentary Reform (Works, vol. 3, p. 493). ...

drama series ''

'' for

BBC2 BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream an ...

, starring

Edward Woodward Edward Albert Arthur Woodward, OBE (1 June 1930 – 16 November 2009) was an English actor and singer. After graduating from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, he began his career on stage. Throughout his career, he appeared in productions ...

. Greatorex dubbed the series "Nineteen Eighty-Four plus six". Over its two series it portrayed "a Britain in which the rights of the individual had been replaced by the concept of the common good – or, as I put it more brutally, a consensus tyranny." The same year he also devised (with

Gerard Glaister John Leslie Glaister DFC (21 December 1915 – 5 February 2005), known as Gerard or Gerrard Glaister, was a British television producer and director best known for his work with the BBC. Amongst his most notable successes as a producer were ''Co ...

) the

BBC1 BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, ...

wartime drama '' Secret Army''. The show later inspired the sitcom parody ''

'Allo 'Allo! ''Allo 'Allo!'' is a British sitcom television series, created by David Croft and Jeremy Lloyd, starring Gorden Kaye, Carmen Silvera, Guy Siner and Richard Gibson. Originally broadcast on BBC1, the series focuses on the life of a French caf ...

''. When talking about his writing style he said "I am opposed to soft-centred characters, which is why I don't create a lot of Robin Hoods. The world's full of hard cases, real villains. And they need to be confronted with other characters just as hard." His last series for television was ''

Airline An airline is a company that provides civil aviation, air transport services for traveling passengers and freight. Airlines use aircraft to supply these services and may form partnerships or Airline alliance, alliances with other airlines for ...

'' in 1982 (starring

Roy Marsden Roy Marsden (born Roy Anthony Mould; 25 June 1941) is an English actor who portrayed Adam Dalgliesh in the Anglia Television dramatisations (1983–1998) of P. D. James's detective novels, and Neil Burnside in the spy drama ''The Sandbagg ...

). He died in of

renal failure Kidney failure, also known as end-stage kidney disease, is a medical condition in which the kidneys can no longer adequately filter waste products from the blood, functioning at less than 15% of normal levels. Kidney failure is classified as eit ...

Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (), abbreviated Bucks, is a ceremonial county in South East England that borders Greater London to the south-east, Berkshire to the south, Oxfordshire to the west, Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-ea ...

in 2002.

Writing credits

Books

* * * * * * Based on the BBC television series. * * * Based on the Yorkshire Television series. * * *

References

External links

Screenonline page on Wilfred Greatorex
*
Obituary in The GuardianObituary in The Times
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Greatorex, Wilfred 1921 births 2002 deaths English television writers English science fiction writers 20th-century English novelists Writers from Liverpool 20th-century English screenwriters