Roy John Battersby (20 April 1936 – 10 January 2024) was a British television director, known for his work in drama productions such as '' Between The Lines'', ''
Inspector Morse
Endeavour Morse, GM, is the namesake character of the series of "Morse" detective novels by British author Colin Dexter, a Detective Chief Inspector in the Thames Valley Police in Oxford, England.
On television he was portrayed by John ...
'', '' Cracker'' and '' A Touch of Frost.'' Early in his career, he made documentary features for the
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...
programmes '' Tomorrow's World'' and ''Towards Tomorrow''. In 2005, his film '' Red Mercury'' was shown at the
Montreal World Film Festival
The Montreal World Film Festival (), commonly abbreviated MWFF in English or FFM in French, was an annual film festival in Montreal, Quebec, Canada from 1977 to 2019.Judy Loe and was the stepfather of actress
Kate Beckinsale
Kathrin Romany Beckinsale (born 26 July 1973) is an English actress. The only child of actors Richard Beckinsale and Judy Loe, she debuted in the series premiere of the 1975 daytime drama ''Couples.''
In 1993, she made her theatrical film deb ...
. Battersby was a
Trotskyist
Trotskyism (, ) is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Russian revolutionary and intellectual Leon Trotsky along with some other members of the Left Opposition and the Fourth International. Trotsky described himself as an ...
for some years, becoming a full-time organiser for the now defunct Workers Revolutionary Party. The association had ended by 1981, but the connection led to his being blacklisted by the BBC.
Battersby died after a stroke on 10 January 2024, at the age of 87.