Hugh Greene
Sir Hugh Carleton Greene OBE (15 November 1910-19 February 1987[1]) was the Director-General of the British Broadcasting Corporation from 1 January 1960 until 1969. He personally hired Sydney Newman as Head of Drama in 1961 as a deliberate attempt to shake up the drama department to be more competitive with ITV — or, as it was generally known then, ATV.[2]
He also presided over the creation of BBC Two.
Greene was famously involved in a pitched battle with Mary Whitehouse, which began in 1963. He believed that the BBC should offer a wide range of programming to appeal to and reflect all strata of society. Toward this end, he sanctioned the commissioning of a number of shows — most particularly Till Death Us Do Part, the show on which All in the Family was based — which depicted elements of British society of which Whitehouse strongly disapproved. She claimed he was personally responsible for the "moral collapse" of Britain.[3] Eventually Whitehouse gained enough conservative political allies to force Greene's resignation in 1969.
He was succeeded by Charles Curran.
He was the brother of novelist Graham Greene, who appears in-universe as one of the main characters in The Turing Test.
Depictions in fiction[[edit] | [edit source]]
Hugh Bonneville played Greene in The Mary Whitehouse Story.
External links[[edit] | [edit source]]
Footnotes[[edit] | [edit source]]
| |||||
