Louis Marks
Born: 23rd March 1928 (as Louis Frank Marks)
Died: 17th September 2010 (aged 82 years)
Episodes Broadcast: 1964, 1972, 1975-1976
Louis Marks was born in Golders Green, London. He completed an
undergraduate degree in history at Oxford, and then earned a doctorate
with an emphasis on Renaissance-era Florence. He taught at a boarding
school and edited an academic journal; it was through the latter that he
began to contribute to promotional films and documentary programmes. In
1957, Marks married his wife, Sonia, a production assistant at ITV. This
connection led to Marks being commissioned to write episodes of The
Adventures Of Robin Hood and Skyport, and becoming script
supervisor on The Four Just Men.
Marks soon became a prolific scriptwriter, with his contributions
including episodes of Ghost Squad and Danger Man,
alongside Planet Of Giants, the
first story of Doctor Who's second season. Later in the Sixties,
he became the story editor of No Hiding Place and created the
popular soap opera Market In Honey Lane. In the early Seventies,
he script edited a number of programmes for the BBC, including the
seminal horror film The Stone Tape. During this period, he wrote
three more Doctor Who serials; the last of these, The Masque Of Mandragora, drew on
Marks' vast knowledge of the Italian Renaissance.
In the late Seventies, Marks was promoted to producer, focussing on
plays and adaptations of classic literature. Amongst his credits were
The Lost Boys and Sophocles' Oedipus Rex trilogy. He had a
fondness for the work of George Eliot; he produced Silas Marner: The
Weaver Of Raveloe (also his last writing credit) and
Middlemarch before capping his career in television with
Daniel Deronda. Having raised two daughters, Marks and his wife
then ran a bread-and-breakfast establishment until her death in
2006.
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