Vinay Patel
Born: 16th March 1986
Episodes Broadcast: 2018, 2020
Vinay Patel originally worked as a corporate filmmaker. He then took a
job as a technician at the MetFilm School, but he soon grew dissatisfied
and decided to forge a career as a writer. Patel graduated from the
Central School of Speech and Drama in 2011 with a Masters of Arts in
writing, and he initially developed plays including the acclaimed 2014
work True Brits. Its success led to Patel being commissioned for
the short film Is This Thing On? in 2015, followed by the single
drama Murdered By My Father and an episode of The Good Karma
Hospital over the next two years. In 2017, he contributed an essay
to The Good Immigrant: 21 Writers Reflect On Race In Contemporary
Britain, edited by Nikesh Shukla.
Having been a fan of science-fiction shows like Quantum Leap
during his childhood, Patel's first professional opportunity to write
for the genre came when he was invited to contribute to Doctor
Who's 2018 season. The result was the emotionally-charged Demons Of The Punjab, which took
Jodie Whittaker's Thirteenth Doctor to Pakistan during its partition
from India in 1947. Patel joined Malorie Blackman, who had scripted Rosa earlier the same year, as
the only people of colour to write for Doctor Who to that point.
In 2019, his short story Letters From The Front -- a prequel to
Demons Of The Punjab --
appeared in BBC Books' anthology Doctor Who: The Target
Storybook.
Patel returned to Doctor Who in 2020, collaborating with
showrunner Chris Chibnall on the pivotal Fugitive Of The Judoon. It not
only brought back John Barrowman as companion Captain Jack Harkness for
the first time in a decade, but also revealed the existence of Jo
Martin's so-called “Fugitive Doctor”. Patel was preparing a contribution to Doctor
Who's 2021 season as well, but it was abandoned when the COVID-19
pandemic caused the run to be redeveloped as the epic-length Flux.
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