Verity Ann Lambert,
OBEThe Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by King George V. The Order includes five classes in civil and military divisions...
(27 November 1935 – 22 November 2007) was an
EnglishEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the North Sea to the east, with the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
televisionThe primary role of a television producer is to control all aspects of production, ranging from show idea development and cast hiring to shoot supervision and fact-checking...
and
film producerA film producer or movie producer is someone who creates the scenes and conditions for making movies. The producer initiates, co-ordinates, supervises and controls matters such as fund-raising, hiring key personnel and arranging for distributors...
. She is best known as the founding producer of the
science-fiction seriesScience fiction first appeared on television during the golden age of science fiction. Special effects and other production techniques allow creators to present a living visual image of an imaginary world not limited by the constraints of reality; this makes television an excellent medium for...
Doctor WhoDoctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a mysterious alien time-traveller known as "the Doctor" who travels in his space and time-ship, the TARDIS, which normally appears from the exterior to be a blue 1950s police box...
, a programme which has become a part of British
popular culturePopular culture is the totality of ideas, perspectives, attitudes, memes, images and other phenomena that are deemed preferred per an informal consensus within the mainstream of a given culture...
, and her association with
Thames TelevisionThames Television was a licensee of the British ITV television network, covering London and parts of the surrounding counties on weekdays from 30 July 1968 until 31 December 1992. It was both a broadcaster and a producer of television programmes, making shows both for the local region it covered...
. Her many later credits include
Adam Adamant Lives!Adam Adamant Lives! was a British television series which ran from 1966 to 1967 on the BBC. Proposing that an adventurer born in 1867 had been revived from hibernation in 1966, the show was a comedy adventure that took a satirical look at life in the 1960s through the eyes of a Victorian .- The...
,
The Naked Civil ServantThe Naked Civil Servant is the title of two biographical works, both based on the life of Quentin Crisp:*The Naked Civil Servant is Crisp's 1968 autobiographical book...
,
Rock FolliesRock Follies, and its sequel, Rock Follies of '77, was a comedy musical drama shown on British television in the mid 1970s. The storyline, over 12 episodes and two series, followed the ups and downs of a fictional female rock band called the "Little Ladies" as they struggled for recognition and...
,
MinderMinder is a British comedy-drama about the London criminal underworld. Initially produced by Verity Lambert, it was made by Euston Films, a subsidiary of Thames Television and shown on ITV...
,
WidowsWidows was a British primetime television serial aired in 1983, produced by Euston Films for Thames Television and aired on the ITV network....
,
G.B.H.,
Jonathan CreekJonathan Creek is a British mystery series produced by the BBC and written by David Renwick. Primarily a crime drama, the show is also peppered with broadly comic touches, and stars Alan Davies as the titular character, an eccentric magician's assistant who also solves seemingly supernatural...
and
Love SoupLove Soup is a British television comedy-drama, produced by the BBC and first screened on BBC One in the autumn of 2005. It stars Tamsin Greig as Alice Chenery and Michael Landes as Gil Raymond . The series is written by David Renwick of One Foot in the Grave fame, and was produced by Verity Lambert...
.
Lambert began working in television in the 1950s, and continued to work as a producer until the year she died. After leaving the BBC in 1969, she worked for other television companies, notably
Thames TelevisionThames Television was a licensee of the British ITV television network, covering London and parts of the surrounding counties on weekdays from 30 July 1968 until 31 December 1992. It was both a broadcaster and a producer of television programmes, making shows both for the local region it covered...
and its
Euston FilmsEuston Films was a British film and television production company. It was a subsidiary company of Thames Television, and operated from the 1970s to the 1990s, producing various series for Thames, which were screened nationally on the ITV network...
offshoot in the 1970s and 80s. She also worked in the film industry, for
Thorn EMI Screen EntertainmentEMI Films was a British film and television production company and distributor. The company was formed after the takeover of Associated British Picture Corporation in 1968 by EMI....
, and from 1985 ran her own production company,
Cinema VerityCinema Verity was a British independent television and film production company, founded in 1985 by Verity Lambert, the television producer, who named the company after herself and as a pun on the expression 'cinéma vérité'....
.
The
British Film InstituteThe British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
's
Screenonlinescreenonline is a Web site devoted to the history of British film and television, and to social history as revealed by film and television. The project has been developed by the British Film Institute and funded by a £1.2 million grant from the National Lottery New Opportunities Fund.Reviews...
website describes Lambert as "one of those producers who can often create a fascinating small screen universe from a slim script and half-a-dozen congenial players."
Women were rarely television producers in Britain at the beginning of Lambert's career. When she was appointed to
Doctor Who in 1963 she was the youngest producer, and only female drama producer, working at the
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation, usually referred to by its abbreviation as the "BBC", is the longest established and largest broadcaster in the world...
. The website of the
Museum of Broadcast CommunicationsThe Museum of Broadcast Communications is located in Chicago, Illinois. Its mission is "to collect, preserve, and present historic and contemporary radio and television content as well as educate, inform, and entertain through our archives, public programs, screenings, exhibits, publications and...
hails her as "not only one of Britain's leading businesswomen, but possibly the most powerful member of the nation's entertainment industry ... Lambert has served as a symbol of the advances won by women in the media". News of her death came on the 44th anniversary of the first showing of
Doctor Who.
Early career in independent television
Lambert was born in
London[]London is the capital of England and the United Kingdom. It has been a major settlement for two millennia, and the history of London goes back to its founding by the Romans, when it was named Londinium. London's core, the ancient City of London, the 'square mile', retains its medieval boundaries...
, the daughter of a Jewish accountant, and educated at
Roedean SchoolRoedean School is an independent girls' school in Roedean village on the outskirts of Brighton, East Sussex in the United Kingdom. The school overlooks the sea and is situated close to the marina. Students attend from many different parts of the world...
. She left Roedean at sixteen and studied at the
SorbonneThe historic University of Paris was founded in the mid 12th century, likely between 1160 and 1170 , In 1970 it was reorganized as 13 autonomous universities...
in
ParisParis is the capital of France and the country's most populous city. It is situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
for a year, and at a secretarial college in London for eighteen months. She later credited her interest in the structural and characterisational aspects of scriptwriting to an inspirational English teacher. Lambert's first job was typing menus at the Kensington De Vere Hotel, which employed her because she had been to
FranceFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
and could speak
FrenchFrench is a Romance language globally spoken by about 65 million people as a first language , by 50 million as a second language, and by about another 200 million people as an acquired foreign language, with significant speakers in 57 countries. Most native speakers of the language live in France,...
. In 1956, she entered the television industry as a secretary at
Granada TelevisionGranada Television is the United Kingdom ITV contractor for North West England and the Isle of Man.It is the only one of the original four ITA franchisees from 1954 that survived as a franchise holder into the twenty-first century. Broadcasting began on 3 May 1956, with the company originally...
's press office. She was sacked from this job after six months.
Following her dismissal from Granada, Lambert took a job as a
shorthandShorthand is an abbreviated symbolic writing method that increases speed or brevity of writing as compared to a normal method of writing a language. The process of writing in shorthand is called stenography, from the Greek stenos and graphē or graphie...
typist at
ABC TelevisionAssociated British Corporation was one of a number of commercial television companies established during the 1950s by cinema chain companies in an attempt to safeguard their business by becoming involved with television which was taking away their cinema audiences.In this case, the parent company...
. She soon became the secretary to the company's Head of Drama, and then a production secretary working on a programme called
State Your Case. She then moved from administration to production, working on drama programming on ABC's popular anthology series
Armchair TheatreArmchair Theatre is a British television drama anthology series, which ran on the ITV network from 1956 until 1968 in its original form, and was resurrected intermittently during the 1970s...
.
Armchair Theatre was overseen at the time by the company's new Head of Drama,
CanadianCanada is a country occupying most of northern North America, extending from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
producer
Sydney NewmanSydney Cecil Newman, OC was a Canadian film and television producer, best remembered for the pioneering work he undertook in British television drama from the late 1950s to the late 1960s...
.
On 28 November 1958, while Lambert was working as a production assistant on
Armchair Theatre, actor
Gareth JonesGareth Jones was a British actor, chiefly remembered for the circumstances of his death. During the live television broadcast of the Armchair Theatre play Underground on the ITV network in the UK, Jones suffered a massive heart attack and died between two of his scenes while in make-up...
died off-screen just prior to a scene in which he was to appear during a
live televisionLive television refers to television broadcast in real time. Today it is used mostly for programs such as Today, CBS This Morning, and local television news. However, from the early days of television until about 1958, it was used heavily, except for filmed shows such as I Love Lucy and Gunsmoke...
broadcast of the hour-long play "Underground". Lambert had to take control of directing the cameras from the studio gallery as director
William KotcheffTed Kotcheff , sometimes credited as William Kotcheff or William T. Kotcheff, is a Canadian film and television director , who is well known for his work on several high-profile British television productions and as a director of films such as First Blood.-Early life:Kotcheff was born William...
hastily worked with the actors during a commercial break to accommodate the loss.
In 1961 Lambert left ABC, spending a year working as the personal assistant to
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
television producer
David SusskindDavid Susskind was a producer of TV, movies, and stage plays and also a pioneer TV talk show host.-Personal:...
at the independent production company
Talent AssociatesTalent Associates was a production company headed by David Susskind, later joined by Daniel Melnick.In the years after World War II, Susskind was a talent agent for Century Artists, ultimately ending up in the powerhouse Music Corporation of America's fairly-newly-minted television program...
in
New YorkNew York is the most populous city in the United States, and the center of the New York metropolitan area, which is among the most populous urban areas in the world. A leading global city, New York exerts a powerful influence over worldwide commerce, finance, culture, fashion and entertainment...
. Returning to England, she rejoined ABC with an ambition to direct, but got stuck as a production assistant, and decided that if she could not find advancement within a year she would abandon television as a career.
BBC career
In December 1962 Sydney Newman left ABC to take up the position of Head of Drama at
BBC TelevisionBBC Television is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation which began in 1932. The British Broadcasting Corporation has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927.-History of BBC Television:...
, and the following year Lambert joined him at the Corporation. Newman had recruited her to produce
Doctor WhoDoctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a mysterious alien time-traveller known as "the Doctor" who travels in his space and time-ship, the TARDIS, which normally appears from the exterior to be a blue 1950s police box...
, a programme he had personally initiated. Conceived by Newman as an educational science-fiction series for children, the programme concerned the adventures of a crotchety old man travelling through space and time with his sometimes unwilling companions in
a machine larger on the inside than the outThe TARDIS is a time machine and spacecraft in the British science fiction television programme Doctor Who....
. The show was a risk, and in some quarters not expected to last longer than thirteen weeks.
Although Lambert was not Newman's first choice to produce the series —
Don TaylorDonald Victor Taylor was an English writer, director and producer, active across theatre, radio and television for over forty years...
and
Shaun SuttonShaun Alfred Graham Sutton OBE was an English television writer, director, producer and executive, who worked in the medium for nearly forty years from the 1950s to the 1990s...
had both declined the position — the Canadian was very keen to ensure that Lambert took the job after his experience of working with her at ABC. "I think the best thing I ever did on that was to find Verity Lambert," he told
Doctor Who MagazineDoctor Who Magazine is a magazine devoted to the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Its current editor is Tom Spilsbury.-History:...
in 1993. "I remembered Verity as being bright and, to use the phrase, full of piss and vinegar! She was gutsy and she used to fight and argue with me, even though she was not at a very high level as a production assistant."
When Lambert arrived at the BBC in June 1963, she was initially given a more experienced associate producer,
Mervyn PinfieldMervyn Pinfield was a British Television producer and director working for the BBC during the 1950s and 1960s. He is well known for being the associate producer on the BBC television series Doctor Who from the first episode of An Unearthly Child to The Romans, during Verity Lambert's tenure as...
, to assist her.
Doctor Who debuted on 23 November 1963 and quickly became a success for the BBC, chiefly on the popularity of the alien creatures known as
DalekThe Daleks are a fictional race of extraterrestrial mutants from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Daleks are organisms from the planet Skaro, integrated within a tank-like mechanical casing. The resulting creatures are a powerful race bent on universal conquest and...
s. Lambert's superior, Head of Serials Donald Wilson, had strongly advised against using the script in which the Daleks first appeared, but after the serial's successful airing, he said that Lambert clearly knew the series far better than he did, and he would no longer interfere in her decisions. The success of
Doctor Who and the Daleks also garnered press attention for Lambert herself; in 1964, the
Daily MailThe Daily Mail is a British daily tabloid newspaper. First published in 1896 by Lord Northcliffe, it is the United Kingdom's second biggest-selling daily newspaper after The Sun. Its sister paper, The Mail on Sunday was launched in 1982. Scottish and Irish editions of the paper were launched in...
published a feature on the series focusing on the perceived attractiveness of its young producer: "The operation of the Daleks ... is conducted by a remarkably attractive young woman called Verity Lambert who, at 28, is not only the youngest but the only female drama producer at B.B.C. TV... [T]all, dark and shapely, she became positively forbidding when I suggested that the Daleks might one day take over
Dr. Who."
Lambert oversaw the first two seasons of the programme, eventually leaving in 1965. "There comes a time when a series need new input," she told
Doctor Who Magazine thirty years later. "It's not that I wasn't fond of
Doctor Who, I simply felt that the time had come. It had been eighteen very concentrated months, something like seventy shows. I know people do soaps forever now, but I felt
Doctor Who needed someone to come in with a different view."
She moved on to produce another BBC show created by Newman, the swashbuckling action-adventure series
Adam Adamant Lives!Adam Adamant Lives! was a British television series which ran from 1966 to 1967 on the BBC. Proposing that an adventurer born in 1867 had been revived from hibernation in 1966, the show was a comedy adventure that took a satirical look at life in the 1960s through the eyes of a Victorian .- The...
(1966–67). The long development period of
Adam Adamant delayed its production, and during this delay Newman gave her the initial episodes of a new
soap operaA soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on television or radio. The name "soap opera" stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers such as Procter & Gamble,...
,
The NewcomersThe Newcomers was a late 1960s BBC soap opera which dealt with the subject of a London family, the Coopers, who moved to a housing estate in the fictional country town of Angleton. It was broadcast in bi-weekly half hour episodes from 5 October 1965 until 28 November 1969...
, to produce. Further productions for the BBC included a season of the crime drama
Detective (1968–69) and a twenty-six-part series of adaptations of the stories of William Somerset Maugham (1969). During this period, Lambert was obscurely referenced in
Monty PythonMonty Python’s Flying Circus is a BBC sketch comedy programme from the Monty Python comedy team, and the group's initial claim to fame. The show was noted for its surreality, risqué or innuendo-laden humour, sight gags, and sketches without punchlines...
’s 1969 sketch "Buying a Bed," which featured two shop assistants called Mr. Verity and Mr. Lambert, named after her.
In 1969 she left the staff of the BBC to join
London Weekend TelevisionLondon Weekend Television is the ITV network franchise holder for London and the South East at weekends, broadcasting from Fridays at 5:15pm. to Monday mornings at 5:59am....
, where she produced
BudgieBudgie was a popular British television series starring former popstar Adam Faith which was produced by ITV company London Weekend Television and broadcast on the ITV network between 1971 and 1972....
(1970–72) and
Between the Wars (1973). In 1974, she returned to the BBC on a freelance basis to produce
Shoulder to Shoulder, a series of six 75-minute plays about the
suffragetteSuffragette is a term originally coined by the Daily Mail newspaper as a derogatory label for the more radical and militant members of the late-19th and early-20th century movement for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom, in particular members of the Women's Social and Political Union...
movement of the early 20th century.
Thames Television and Euston Films
Later in 1974 Lambert became Head of Drama at
Thames TelevisionThames Television was a licensee of the British ITV television network, covering London and parts of the surrounding counties on weekdays from 30 July 1968 until 31 December 1992. It was both a broadcaster and a producer of television programmes, making shows both for the local region it covered...
, a successor company of her former employers ABC. During her time in this position she oversaw several high-profile and successful contributions to the
ITVITV is a public service network of British commercial television broadcasters, set up under the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC. ITV is the oldest commercial television network in the UK...
network, including
The Naked Civil ServantThe Naked Civil Servant is the title of two biographical works, both based on the life of Quentin Crisp:*The Naked Civil Servant is Crisp's 1968 autobiographical book...
(1975),
Rock FolliesRock Follies, and its sequel, Rock Follies of '77, was a comedy musical drama shown on British television in the mid 1970s. The storyline, over 12 episodes and two series, followed the ups and downs of a fictional female rock band called the "Little Ladies" as they struggled for recognition and...
(1976–77),
Rumpole of the BaileyRumpole of the Bailey is a British television series created and written by the British writer and barrister John Mortimer, QC which starred Leo McKern as Horace Rumpole, an aging London barrister who defends any and all clients...
(1978–92) and
Edward and Mrs SimpsonEdward & Mrs. Simpson is a seven-part British television series that dramatises the events leading to the 1936 abdication of King Edward VIII of the United Kingdom, who gave up his throne to marry the twice-divorced American Wallis Simpson....
(1978). In 1976 she was also made responsible for overseeing the work of
Euston FilmsEuston Films was a British film and television production company. It was a subsidiary company of Thames Television, and operated from the 1970s to the 1990s, producing various series for Thames, which were screened nationally on the ITV network...
, Thames' subsidiary film production company, at the time best known as the producers of
The SweeneyThe Sweeney is a British television police drama focusing on two members of the Flying Squad, an elite branch of the Metropolitan Police specialising in tackling armed robbery and violent crime in London...
. In 1979 she transferred to Euston full-time as the company's Chief Executive, overseeing productions such as
QuatermassQuatermass is a British television science fiction serial produced by Euston Films for Thames Television and broadcast on the ITV network in October and November 1979. Like its three predecessors, Quatermass was written by Nigel Kneale...
(1979),
MinderMinder is a British comedy-drama about the London criminal underworld. Initially produced by Verity Lambert, it was made by Euston Films, a subsidiary of Thames Television and shown on ITV...
(1979–94) and
WidowsWidows was a British primetime television serial aired in 1983, produced by Euston Films for Thames Television and aired on the ITV network....
(1983).
At Thames and Euston, Lambert enjoyed the most sustained period of critical and popular success of her career.
The Naked Civil Servant won a British Academy Television Award (BAFTA) for its star
John HurtJohn Vincent Hurt, CBE is an English actor. Hurt initially came to prominence for his role as Richard Rich in the 1966 film A Man for All Seasons, and has since retained a career as a lead and supporting actor of many popular motion pictures, including: Watership Down, Midnight Express, Alien, The...
as well as a
Broadcasting Press GuildThe Broadcasting Press Guild is a British association of journalists who specialise in writing and broadcasting about television, radio and the media generally....
Award and a prize at the
Prix ItaliaThe Prix Italia is a international Italian television film and radio-broadcasting award. It was establed in 1948 by RAI - Radiotelevisione Italiana in Capri. Initially for radio, it was extended to cover television in 1957.-External links:* * from IMDB...
;
Rock Follies won a BAFTA and a
Royal Television SocietyThe Royal Television Society is a British-based society for the discussion, analysis and preservation of television in all its forms, past, present and future. It is the one of the oldest television societies in the world...
Award, while
Widows also gained BAFTA nominations and ratings of over 12 million — unusually for a drama serial, it picked up viewers over the course of its six-week run.
Minder went on to become the longest-running series produced by Euston Films, surviving for over a decade following Lambert's departure from the company.
Television historian Lez Cooke described Lambert's time in control of the drama department at Thames as "an adventurous period for the company, demonstrating that it was not only the BBC that was capable of producing progressive television drama during the 1970s. Lambert wanted Thames to produce drama series 'which were attempting in one way or another to tackle modern problems and life,' an ambition which echoed the philosophy of her mentor Sydney Newman." Howard Schuman, the writer of
Rock Follies, also later praised the bravery of Lambert's commissioning. "Verity Lambert had just arrived as head of drama at Thames TV and she went for broke," he told
The ObserverThe Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In about the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a left-liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-History:The...
newspaper in 2002. "She commissioned a serial,
Jennie: Lady Randolph Churchill, for safety, but also
Bill Brand, one of the edgiest political dramas ever, and us... Before we had even finished making the first series, Verity commissioned the second."
Lambert's association with Thames and Euston Films continued into the 1980s. In 1982, she rejoined the staff of parent company Thames Television as Director of Drama, and was given a seat on the company's
boardA board of directors is a body of elected or appointed members who jointly oversee the activities of a company or organization. The body sometimes has a different name, such as board of trustees, board of governors, board of managers, or executive board...
. In November 1982 she left Thames, but remained as Chief Executive at Euston until November of the following year, to take up her first post in the
filmFilm encompasses individual motion pictures, the field of film as an art form, and the motion picture industry. Films are produced by recording images from the world with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects....
industry, as Director of Production for
Thorn EMI Screen EntertainmentEMI Films was a British film and television production company and distributor. The company was formed after the takeover of Associated British Picture Corporation in 1968 by EMI....
. Her job here was somewhat frustrating as the British film industry was in one of its periodic states of flux, but she did manage to produce some noteworthy features, including the 1986
John CleeseJohn Marwood Cleese is an Academy Award-nominated English actor, comedian, writer, and film producer who is known for being a member of the group of comedians responsible for the sketch show Monty Python's Flying Circus and the four Monty Python films: And Now for Something Completely Different,...
film
ClockwiseClockwise is a 1986 British comedy film starring John Cleese. It was directed by Christopher Morahan, written by Michael Frayn and produced by Michael Codron. The film was co-produced by Moment Films and Thorn EMI Screen Entertainment...
.
Lambert later expressed some regret on her time in the film industry in a feature for
The IndependentThe Independent is a British newspaper published by Tony O'Reilly's Independent News & Media. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily newspapers. The daily edition was named National...
newspaper. "Unfortunately, the person who hired me left, and the person who came in didn't want to produce films and didn't want me. While I managed to make some films I was proud of —
Dennis PotterDennis Christopher George Potter was an English dramatist, best known for The Singing Detective. His widely acclaimed television dramas mixed fantasy and reality, the personal and the social. He was particularly fond of using themes and images from popular culture.-Biography:Dennis Potter was born...
's
DreamchildDreamchild is a 1985 drama film produced by Verity Lambert, directed by Gavin Millar and written by Dennis Potter. It stars Coral Browne, Ian Holm, Peter Gallagher, Nicola Cowper and Amelia Shankley and is a fictionalized account of Alice Liddell, the child who inspired Lewis Carroll's famous...
, and
Clockwise with John Cleese — it was terribly tough and not a very happy experience."
Verity Lambert was Chair of the
British Film InstituteThe British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
Production Board in 1981/1982.
Cinema Verity
In late 1985 Lambert left Thorn EMI, frustrated at the lack of success and at restructuring measures being undertaken by the company. She established her own independent production company,
Cinema VerityCinema Verity was a British independent television and film production company, founded in 1985 by Verity Lambert, the television producer, who named the company after herself and as a pun on the expression 'cinéma vérité'....
. The company's first production was the 1988 feature film
A Cry in the DarkA Cry in the Dark is a 1988 Australian docudrama film directed by Fred Schepisi. The screenplay by Schepisi and Robert Caswell is based on John Bryson's 1985 book Evil Angels, the title under which the film was released in Australia...
, starring
Sam NeillNigel John Dermot "Sam" Neill, DCNZM, OBE is a New Zealand actor who was born in Northern Ireland.He has had a number of high-profile roles including: the lead in Reilly, Ace of Spies, the adult Damien in Omen III: The Final Conflict, Merlin in the miniseries Merlin, the executive officer, Capt...
and
Meryl StreepMary Louise "Meryl" Streep is an American actress who has worked in theatre, television, and film. She is widely regarded as one of the most talented and respected movie actors of the modern era....
and based on the "
dingo babyAzaria Chantel Loren Chamberlain was a nine-week-old Australian baby who disappeared on the night of 17 August 1980 on a camping trip to Ayers Rock with her family...
" case in
AustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the continental mainland , the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans...
. Cinema Verity's first television series, the BBC1 sitcom
May to DecemberMay to December was a British sitcom which ran for 39 episodes, from 2 April 1989 to 27 May 1994 on BBC One. The series was written by Paul Mendelson and produced by Cinema Verity....
, debuted in 1989 and ran until 1994. The company also produced another successful BBC1 sitcom,
So Haunt MeSo Haunt Me is a British television sitcom about a family that moves into a home occupied by the ghost of its previous resident, a middle-aged Jewish mother. The show was produced by Cinema Verity for the BBC and originally aired from 1992 to 1994....
, which ran from 1992 to 1994.
Lambert executive produced
Alan BleasdaleAlan Bleasdale , now in Merseyside, England is an English television dramatist, best known for writing several social realist drama serials based on the lives of ordinary people.-Early life:...
's hard-hitting drama serial
G.B.H. for
Channel 4Channel 4 is a UK public-service television broadcaster which began working on November 2, 1982. Although commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station owned now and operated by the Channel Four Television...
in 1991, winning critical acclaim and several awards. Lambert's relationship with Bleasdale was not entirely smooth, however — the writer has admitted in subsequent interviews that he "wanted to kill Verity Lambert" after she insisted on the cutting of large portions of his first draft script before production began. However, Bleasdale subsequently admitted that she was right about the majority of the cut material, and when the production was finished he only missed one small scene from those she had demanded be excised.
A less successful Cinema Verity production, and the most noted mis-step of Lambert's career, was the soap opera
Eldorado, a co-production with the BBC set in a British
expatriateAn expatriate is a person temporarily or permanently residing in a country and culture other than that of the person's upbringing or legal residence...
community in
SpainSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain , is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula.
[The Spanish constitution does not establish any official denomination of the country, even though España , Estado español and Nación española are used interchangeably...]
. At the time it was the most expensive commission the BBC had given out to an independent production company. Launched with a major publicity campaign and running in a high-profile slot three nights a week on BBC1, the series was critically mauled and lasted only a year, from 1992 to 1993. Lambert's biography at
Screenonline suggests some reasons for this failure: "With on-location production facilities and an evident striving for a genuinely contemporary flavour, Lambert's costly Euro soap
Eldorado suggested a degree of ambition ... which it seemed in the event ill-equipped to realise, and a potentially interesting subject tailed off into implausible melodrama.
Eldorado's plotting ... was disappointingly ponderous. As a result, the expatriate community in southern Spain theme and milieu was exploited rather than explored." Other reviewers, even the best part of a decade after the programme's cancellation, were much harsher, with Rupert Smith's comments in
The GuardianThe Guardian is a British daily newspaper owned by the Guardian Media Group. Founded in 1821, it is unique among major British newspapers in being owned by a foundation .The Guardian Weekly, which circulates worldwide, provides a compact digest of four newspapers...
in 2002 being a typical example. "A £10 million farce that left the BBC with egg all over its entire body and put an awful lot
EquityThe Actors' Equity Association , commonly referred to as Actors' Equity or simply Equity, is an American labor union embracing the world of live theatrical performance, as opposed to film and television performance. However, performers appearing on live stage productions without a book or...
members back on the dole... it will always be remembered as the most expensive flop of all time."
In the early 1990s, Lambert attempted to win the rights to produce
Doctor Who independently for the BBC; however, this effort was unsuccessful because the Corporation was already in negotiations with producer
Philip SegalPhilip David Segal is a television producer. He emigrated to the United States in 1975 at the age of seventeen, where he studied film at San Diego State University...
in the
United StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. Cinema Verity projects that did reach production included
SleepersSleepers is a 1991 comedy-drama produced by Cinema Verity for the BBC, set around the period of Glasnost in the Soviet Union.-Plot summary:...
(BBC1, 1991) and
The Cazalets (BBC One, 2001), the latter co-produced by actress
Joanna LumleyJoanna Lamond Lumley, OBE, FRGS is an English actress, best known for her roles in the British television series The New Avengers, Sapphire and Steel, Absolutely Fabulous and Sensitive Skin...
, whose idea it was to adapt the novels by
Elizabeth Jane Howard- Introduction :Elizabeth Jane Howard, CBE is an English novelist. She was an actress and a model before becoming a novelist. In 1951, she won the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize for her first novel, The Beautiful Visit. Six further novels followed, before she embarked on her best known work, a four...
.
Lambert continued to work as a freelance producer outside of her own company. She produced the popular BBC One comedy-drama series
Jonathan CreekJonathan Creek is a British mystery series produced by the BBC and written by David Renwick. Primarily a crime drama, the show is also peppered with broadly comic touches, and stars Alan Davies as the titular character, an eccentric magician's assistant who also solves seemingly supernatural...
, by writer
David RenwickDavid Peter Renwick is an English television writer, best known for creation of the sitcom One Foot in the Grave and the mystery series Jonathan Creek....
, ever since taking over the role for its second series in 1998. From then until 2004 she produced eighteen episodes of the programme across four short seasons, plus two Christmas Specials. She and Renwick also collaborated on another comedy-drama,
Love SoupLove Soup is a British television comedy-drama, produced by the BBC and first screened on BBC One in the autumn of 2005. It stars Tamsin Greig as Alice Chenery and Michael Landes as Gil Raymond . The series is written by David Renwick of One Foot in the Grave fame, and was produced by Verity Lambert...
, starring
Tamsin GreigTamsin Greig is an Olivier Award-winning British actress. She is known for two Channel 4 television comedy parts: Fran Katzenjammer in Black Books and Dr. Caroline Todd in Green Wing...
and transmitted on BBC One in the autumn of 2005.
In 1973, Lambert married television director Colin Bucksey (a man ten years her junior), but the marriage collapsed in 1984, and they divorced in 1987. She had no children, once telling an interviewer, "I can't stand babies — no, I love babies as long as their parents take them away." In 2000 two of her productions,
Doctor Who and
The Naked Civil Servant, finished third and fourth respectively in a
British Film InstituteThe British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
poll of the
100 Greatest British Television Programmes100 Greatest British Television Programmes was a list compiled in 2000 by the British Film Institute , chosen by a poll of industry professionals, to determine what were the greatest British television programmes of any genre ever to have been screened....
of the 20th century.
In the 2002 New Year's Honours list Lambert was appointed an
Officer of the Order of the British EmpireThe Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by King George V. The Order includes five classes in civil and military divisions...
(OBE) for her services to film and television production, and the same year she received BAFTA's
Alan ClarkeAlan Clarke was a television and film director, producer and writer, born in Birkenhead, Cheshire, England....
Award for Outstanding Contribution to Television. She died of cancer five days before her 72nd birthday. She was due to have been presented with a lifetime achievement award at the Women in Film and Television Awards the following month.
Her last work was to produce the second series of
Love Soup. A dedication, to her memory, was shown after the first episode was aired on March 1 2008.
She left more than £2.5m in her will.
In the 2007
Doctor Who episode "
Human Nature"Human Nature" is the eighth episode of the third series of the revived British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It is the first episode of a two-part story written by Paul Cornell , adapted from his 1995 Doctor Who novel Human Nature...
", the Doctor (as John Smith) refers to his parents as Sydney and Verity, a tribute to both Newman and Lambert. And on Christmas Day 2007, in the
Doctor Who episode "
Voyage of the Damned"Voyage of the Damned" is an episode of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. First broadcast on 25 December, 2007, it is 72 minutes long and the third Christmas special since the show’s revival in 2005...
", a dedication, to her memory, was shown at the end of the episode.
Filmography
- Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a mysterious alien time-traveller known as "the Doctor" who travels in his space and time-ship, the TARDIS, which normally appears from the exterior to be a blue 1950s police box...
(1963-1965), producer
- Adam Adamant Lives!
Adam Adamant Lives! was a British television series which ran from 1966 to 1967 on the BBC. Proposing that an adventurer born in 1867 had been revived from hibernation in 1966, the show was a comedy adventure that took a satirical look at life in the 1960s through the eyes of a Victorian .- The...
(1966-1967), producer
- Detective (1968), producer
- Take Three Girls
Take Three Girls was a drama series on BBC TV in the late sixties and early seventies about the lives of three girls sharing a flat in 'Swinging' London. It was one of the first BBC TV drama series shown in colour....
(1969), producer
- W. Somerset Maugham (1969-1970), producer
- Budgie
Budgie was a popular British television series starring former popstar Adam Faith which was produced by ITV company London Weekend Television and broadcast on the ITV network between 1971 and 1972....
(1971), producer
- Between the Wars (1973), producer
- The Silver Mask (1973), producer
- A.D.A.M. (1973), producer
- Achilles Heel (1973), producer
- After Loch Lomond (1973), producer
- Shoulder to Shoulder: Sylvia Pankhurst (1974), producer
- The Naked Civil Servant
The Naked Civil Servant is the title of two biographical works, both based on the life of Quentin Crisp:*The Naked Civil Servant is Crisp's 1968 autobiographical book...
(1975), executive producer
- Rock Follies
Rock Follies, and its sequel, Rock Follies of '77, was a comedy musical drama shown on British television in the mid 1970s. The storyline, over 12 episodes and two series, followed the ups and downs of a fictional female rock band called the "Little Ladies" as they struggled for recognition and...
(1976), executive producer
- Couples (1976), executive producer
- The Norman Conquests (1977), producer
- ITV Playhouse
ITV Playhouse was a UK comedy-drama TV series that ran from 1967 to 1983, which was scripted by Dennis Potter and Alan Sharp. The series began in black and white, but was later filmed in colour...
: Roadrunner (1977), executive producer
- The Sailor's Return (1978), executive producer
- Charlie Muffin
Charlie Muffin is a 1979 made-for-TV film based on the novel Charlie M by Brian Freemantle. In the U.S., the picture was later re-released under the title A Deadly Game....
(1979), executive producer
- Quatermass
Quatermass is a British television science fiction serial produced by Euston Films for Thames Television and broadcast on the ITV network in October and November 1979. Like its three predecessors, Quatermass was written by Nigel Kneale...
(1979), executive producer
- The Knowledge (1979), executive producer
- A Performance of Macbeth (1979), executive producer
- Fox: King Billy (1980), executive producer
- The Flame Trees of Thika
The Flame Trees of Thikais a British television mini-series of seven hour-long episodes made by Euston Films for Thames Television in 1981. It was adapted by John Hawkesworth from the 1959 book of the same title by Elspeth Huxley, and is set in and around the town of Thika in Kenya's Central Province...
(1981), executive producer
- Saigon: Year of the Cat (1983), producer
- The Nation's Health (1983), executive producer
- Reilly: Ace of Spies (1983), executive producer
- Widows (1983), executive producer
- Minder
A minder is a person assigned to guide or escort a visitor, or to provide protection to somebody, or to otherwise assist or take care of something, i.e...
(1979-1984), executive producer
- Morons from Outer Space
Morons from Outer Space is a 1985 comedy/science-fiction film directed by Mike Hodges. It was released in North America on September 20, 1985.-Plot:...
(1985), executive producer
- Clockwise
A clockwise motion is one that proceeds 'like the clock's hands': from the top to the right, then down and then to the left, and back to the top. In a mathematical sense, a circle defined parametrically in a positive Cartesian plane by the equations x = sin t and y = cos t is traced clockwise as...
(1986), executive producer
- Link (1986), executive producer
- Evil Angels (1988), producer
- American Roulette (1988), executive producer
- Coasting: Offshore (1990), producer
- G.B.H. (1991), executive producer
- Sleepers
Sleepers is a 1991 comedy-drama produced by Cinema Verity for the BBC, set around the period of Glasnost in the Soviet Union.-Plot summary:...
(1991), executive producer
- Boys from the Bush (1991), producer
- Eldorado
Eldorado was a British soap opera that ran for only one year, from 6 July 1992 to 9 July 1993. Set in Coín on the Costa Del Sol and based around the lives of British and European expats, the BBC hoped it would be as successful as EastEnders and replicate some of the sunshine and glamour of imported...
(1992), producer
- Comics (1993), producer
- Class Act (1994), producer
- Heavy Weather
Heavy Weather was a dramatisation for television by Douglas Livingstone of the novel Heavy Weather by P. G. Wodehouse , set at Blandings Castle...
(1995), producer
- Temp (1995), producer
- She's Out (1995), producer
- A Perfect State
A Perfect State was a 1997 British situation comedy starring Gwen Taylor, Trevor Cooper, Emma Amos and Danny Webb. It debuted on BBC1 on Thursday 27 February 1997 and ran for seven episodes....
(1997), executive producer
- Jonathan Creek
Jonathan Creek is a British mystery series produced by the BBC and written by David Renwick. Primarily a crime drama, the show is also peppered with broadly comic touches, and stars Alan Davies as the titular character, an eccentric magician's assistant who also solves seemingly supernatural...
(1998-2004), producer
- The Cazalets (2001), producer
- Love Soup
Love Soup is a British television comedy-drama, produced by the BBC and first screened on BBC One in the autumn of 2005. It stars Tamsin Greig as Alice Chenery and Michael Landes as Gil Raymond . The series is written by David Renwick of One Foot in the Grave fame, and was produced by Verity Lambert...
(2005-2008), producer
External links