James MacTaggart (25 April 1928 – 29 May 1974) was a Scottish television producer, director and writer. He worked in London from 1961.
Early life
MacTaggart was born in
Glasgow and served in the
Royal Army Service Corps
The Royal Army Service Corps (RASC) was a corps of the British Army responsible for land, coastal and lake transport, air despatch, barracks administration, the Army Fire Service, staffing headquarters' units, supply of food, water, fuel and dom ...
from 1946, rising to the rank of Captain by the time he was demobbed in 1949.
After his military service, he studied Political Economy and Social Economics at the
University of Glasgow, from which he graduated with an MA in 1954.
Career
After an initial career as an actor, MacTaggart worked as a producer for
BBC Radio in
Scotland before moving into television. He relocated to London around 1961, at the request of his friend, scriptwriter
Troy Kennedy Martin.
MacTaggart aimed to break down the use of
naturalism in television drama: "We were going to destroy naturalism", Kennedy Martin once said, "if possible, before Christmas". In a television career of almost 20 years, MacTaggart wrote, directed or produced nearly 100 plays or episodes.
After his involvement with such series as ''
Storyboard
A storyboard is a graphic organizer that consists of illustrations or images displayed in sequence for the purpose of pre-visualizing a motion picture, animation, motion graphic or interactive media sequence. The storyboarding process, i ...
'' (1961), wholly written by Kennedy Martin, and ''
Studio 4'' (1962), MacTaggart was given the responsibility of producing the second season of ''
The Wednesday Play''. The Head of BBC Drama
Sydney Newman later credited him with the series' success. MacTaggart directed later productions during the anthology series' run and also instalments in its successor, ''
Play for Today
''Play for Today'' is a British television anthology drama series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC1 from 1970 to 1984. During the run, more than three hundred programmes, featuring original television plays, and adaptations of stage ...
''.
MacTaggart joined Kestrel Productions, established by
Kenith Trodd,
Tony Garnett and
Ken Loach, which had an arrangement with the new ITV contractor
London Weekend Television, and directed
Dennis Potter's ''
Moonlight on the Highway
''Moonlight on the Highway'' is a television play by Dennis Potter, first broadcast on 12 April 1969 as part of ITV's ''Saturday Night Theatre'' strand. The tale of a young Al Bowlly obsessive attempting to blot out memories of sexual abuse via ...
'' (1969), with
Ian Holm in the play's leading role, and
Simon Gray's ''Pig in the Poke'' (also 1969). The company's initial burst of activity was short-lived, and MacTaggart returned to the BBC as a freelance.
His only feature film, ''
All the Way Up'', was released in 1970.
MacTaggart died unexpectedly of a heart attack in 1974 in
Chiswick
Chiswick ( ) is a district of west London, England. It contains Hogarth's House, the former residence of the 18th-century English artist William Hogarth; Chiswick House, a neo-Palladian villa regarded as one of the finest in England; and Full ...
, London before finishing ''
Robinson Crusoe'' (1974).
Legacy
A lecture in his memory is delivered annually at the
Edinburgh International Television Festival each August. In an interview for ''
The Guardian'' published in October 2019,
Ken Loach said of MacTaggart: "Jimmy was an iconoclast, constantly trying to knock down authority. The people giving the lecture are the authority that MacTaggart would have cut off at their knees. Now they use it as a mouthpiece for the establishment."
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Mactaggart, James
1928 births
1974 deaths
20th-century British Army personnel
Alumni of the University of Glasgow
BBC radio producers
BBC television producers
Scottish television directors
Scottish television producers
Scottish television writers