GERARD GLAISTER

One of Britain's foremost television producers, Gerard Glaister was responsible for a string of top rating hit series including Dr Finlay's Casebook, Secret Army, Colditz, The Expert and Howard's Way. Glaister was born in 1915, the son of a Royal Navy surgeon. He studied acting at RADA and made his West End acting debut in 1939 before serving in the RAF. During the war he was the skipper of a Blenheim bomber and then became a photo reconnaisance pilot in the Western Desert, where he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross. After being demobbed he worked in repertory before joining the BBC as a director in 1957. He worked for nine years on BBC's Dr Finlay's Casebook, the Scottish medical drama which starred Bill Simpson and Andrew Cruickshank. In 1968 he produced the BBC2 drama series, The Expert, which featured Marius Goring as a pathologist helping police with their investigations. Glaister produced more than 30 television series and in his later career he both produced and devised the air freight company series Buccaneer (1980) and Trainer (1991), a BBC weekly drama in which a young trainer tries to succeed in the competitive world of horse racing. Shortly after Trainer finished Glaister retired from television.