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purplecat

Black and White head shot of a woman with a 1950s hairstyle, wearing headphones with a microphone.

Paddy Russell, the first and, for a long time the only, female director of Doctor Who.

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From:

nostalgia

I always assumed Paddy Russell was a man!

From:

purplecat

I believe she's said the confusion often worked to her benefit. It's much easier to just not employ someone because they are a woman and claim this was because someone better was available than it is to sack them when they turn up to work on the first day and you realise, to your surprise, that you've employed a woman.

EDIT: Though it does suggest there wasn't much interviewing going on - maybe in the BBC in those days you just passed around CVs of people on staff and people picked some out for what they wanted.

Edited Date: 2023-06-11 10:11 am (UTC)

From:

daniel-saunders.livejournal.com

Though others here my be able to correct me, I think in those days there was a lot of people just being assigned by department heads rather than chosen.

I just re-watched Quatermass II which she worked on...

From:

sir_guinglain

I think you are right - I remember reading about how Verity Lambert was ordered to report to the BBC studio at Birmingham to become producer of Swizzlewick without consolation. It was very military!

From:

purplecat

Maybe the story was that she'd get assigned, someone would look at the name and not raise any objection and, when she turned up on set, it was too late to complain you'd been sent a woman!

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