Hazel Adair, British television writer, Died at 95

  Writers

Hazel Adair was born on July 9, 1920, and died on November 23, 2015.

He was a creator and writer of British soap operas for radio and television.

Hazel is best known for co-creating Crossroads with Peter Ling.

Born as Hazel Joyce Willett in 1920 in Darjeeling, India, Adair began her career as an actress with parts in the film My Brother Jonathan (1948) and the BBC television drama Lady Precious Stream (1950).

Hazel then turned her attention to writing scripts for radio and television.

Together with Ronald Marriott she wrote the Stranger from Space (1951–53) television series, about an alien from Mars who befriends a boy on Earth.

Hazel and Peter Ling wrote scripts for Mrs Dale’s Diary.

Adair and Ling created the Compact and Crossroads series, and wrote for programmes such as Champion House (1967 to 1968) and for Doctor Who; the script by Adair and Ling for the latter was produced as an audio book decades later.

As a script writer on Emergency – Hazel 10 in 1964, Hazel wrote what was long thought to be the first interracial kiss on television in Britain, but this has been found to be incorrect.

In her other work, Compact featured the first black actor to appear regularly and the earliest unmarried mother in a soap, while Crossroads had the first black family to be included in the regular cast of a British soap.

Hazel was joint head of the Writer’s Guild with Denis Norden and called a six-week strike in the 1960s, which eventually led Lew Grade agreeing to minimum wages and royalties for script writers.

She wrote the Bob Monkhouse movie Dentist on the Job (1961) with Hugh Woodhouse.

In the 1970s, Hazel ventured into producing and directing films such as Virgin Witch (1971) and Game for Vultures (1979).

Hazel also produced sex comedies such as Clinic Exclusive (1971) and Keep It Up Downstairs (1976).

Hazel passed away on 23 November 2015 at the age of 95.