TONY HOLLAND
'Tony Holland' (born in London, England) is a television writer. He is most famously credited as a writer and co-creator of the BBC soap opera ''EastEnders''.
His career in television began on the popular police drama, ''Z-Cars'' as a writer and script editor. It was here that he met producer and director, Julia Smith and started a long and successful working relationship.
Tony and Julia became an established producer/script-editor team during their time on ''Z-Cars'' and went on to work for the BBC's hospital drama, ''Angels''.
It was during their time on ''Angels'' that the format of the programme was expanded from weekly hour-long episodes to a bi-weekly half-hour serial, with the further possibility of the show being aired all year round. And in 1983 the BBC approached Tony and Julia to produce a new experience for their channel, a bi-weekly soap-opera that would rival efforts from the long established ITV favourites, ''Coronation Street'', ''Crossroads'' and ''Emmerdale Farm''. The BBC wanted this new serial to reflect "London, today!" and together, Julia and Tony came up with the idea of a programme set in a Victorian Square within the East End of London, focusing on its close working-class families and eccentric Cockney inhabitants. Thus, ''EastEnders'' was born.
Tony and Julia wanted a primary focus of ''EastEnders'' to be a large extended family, representative of the type most typically found in the East End of London. Tony was from a large London family himself, and in creating some of the show's characters he was able to use some of his own experiences as inspiration for ''EastEnders'' central clan the Beales and the Fowlers. In creating the stories and characters, Tony delved into family stories, past and present. His aunt Lou Beale came to inspire the Eastenders character of the same name, along with her two children Peter (Pete) and Pauline. Tony also used some of his experiences as a bar-man in London's pubs and clubs to create the dynamic pairing of Landlord and Landlady Den and Angie Watts.
Tony worked on ''EastEnders'' for four years, initially as script-editor and going on to script many episodes himself. Thanks to the genius of its two creators, and their inate ability to understand the workings of popular British drama, the show experienced huge success. But after only four years, Tony and Julia decided to call it a day, leaving ''EastEnders'' together in 1989. In 1991, they were famously tempted back to the 'world of Soap' by the BBC to produce ''Eldorado'', loosely based around the lives of Ex-pats in Spain. Their new show was launched in July 1992, but plagued by a string on and off-screen problems, it received little of ''Eastenders'' immense success, and was subsequently axed a year later, in July 1993.
Since the failure of ''Eldorado'' and the death of his working-partner Julia Smith in 1997, Tony has all but disappeared from the writing-credits of popular British drama, contributing mainly to television-serials overseas.
In 2002, he was awarded with a Special Achievement Award from the British Soap Awards, and in 2004 he appeared on the Channel 4 documentary ''How Soaps Changed The World''.
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His career in television began on the popular police drama, ''Z-Cars'' as a writer and script editor. It was here that he met producer and director, Julia Smith and started a long and successful working relationship.
Tony and Julia became an established producer/script-editor team during their time on ''Z-Cars'' and went on to work for the BBC's hospital drama, ''Angels''.
It was during their time on ''Angels'' that the format of the programme was expanded from weekly hour-long episodes to a bi-weekly half-hour serial, with the further possibility of the show being aired all year round. And in 1983 the BBC approached Tony and Julia to produce a new experience for their channel, a bi-weekly soap-opera that would rival efforts from the long established ITV favourites, ''Coronation Street'', ''Crossroads'' and ''Emmerdale Farm''. The BBC wanted this new serial to reflect "London, today!" and together, Julia and Tony came up with the idea of a programme set in a Victorian Square within the East End of London, focusing on its close working-class families and eccentric Cockney inhabitants. Thus, ''EastEnders'' was born.
Tony and Julia wanted a primary focus of ''EastEnders'' to be a large extended family, representative of the type most typically found in the East End of London. Tony was from a large London family himself, and in creating some of the show's characters he was able to use some of his own experiences as inspiration for ''EastEnders'' central clan the Beales and the Fowlers. In creating the stories and characters, Tony delved into family stories, past and present. His aunt Lou Beale came to inspire the Eastenders character of the same name, along with her two children Peter (Pete) and Pauline. Tony also used some of his experiences as a bar-man in London's pubs and clubs to create the dynamic pairing of Landlord and Landlady Den and Angie Watts.
Tony worked on ''EastEnders'' for four years, initially as script-editor and going on to script many episodes himself. Thanks to the genius of its two creators, and their inate ability to understand the workings of popular British drama, the show experienced huge success. But after only four years, Tony and Julia decided to call it a day, leaving ''EastEnders'' together in 1989. In 1991, they were famously tempted back to the 'world of Soap' by the BBC to produce ''Eldorado'', loosely based around the lives of Ex-pats in Spain. Their new show was launched in July 1992, but plagued by a string on and off-screen problems, it received little of ''Eastenders'' immense success, and was subsequently axed a year later, in July 1993.
Since the failure of ''Eldorado'' and the death of his working-partner Julia Smith in 1997, Tony has all but disappeared from the writing-credits of popular British drama, contributing mainly to television-serials overseas.
In 2002, he was awarded with a Special Achievement Award from the British Soap Awards, and in 2004 he appeared on the Channel 4 documentary ''How Soaps Changed The World''.
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