"Molly" Cox born Marie-Thérèse Henriette Cunningham became Marie-Thérèse Henriette Cox (19 October 1925 – 3 November 1991) was a British television producer for BBC children TV. Her successes include '' Play School'', '' Zokko!'' and '' Jackanory''.

Life

Cox was born in

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in 1925. Her parents, Aileen Turner and Arthur Joseph Cunningham, were living in Turkey. They moved to Alexandria when their father left his job at Lloyds and became the editor of the ''

Egyptian Gazette ''The Egyptian Gazette'' is an English-language Egyptian daily, part of El Tahrir Printing and Publishing House. First published on 26 January 1880, it is the oldest English-language newspaper in the Middle East. Eyad Abu El Haggag is chairma ...

''. She joined the BBC in 1942 and trained to be a sound engineer on a course that was otherwise taken entirely by male employees. She creating the sound effects for the radio serial ''

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''. She married and left the BBC as she became the mother of two sons. She returned in 1962 after her husband, Charles Terence "Terry" Cox, died. After a spell on radio, she joined the '' Blue Peter'' team. She worked for

Joy Whitby Joy Whitby (born 27 July 1930) is an English television producer and executive who has specialised in children's programmes during her career. Early life Whitby read History at St Anne's College, Oxford, and, after graduating, her first job wa ...

and they developed the children's TV series '' Play School'' which was the first programme shown on the new channel BBC2. She was involved in the creation of '' Jackanory'' with Anna Home. where actors would read a story supported by pictures. The simple format required the best graphics, the best stories and the best readers. The programme began its run in 1965. "At first people were unwilling to participate in this unknown programme", Anna Home recalled in 1997. "But when actors realised it was the opportunity to have 15 minutes' solo experience on television, they began to queue up to get on it, and having done a ''Jackanory'' became a bit like having done your ''

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''." Cox and Paul Ciani created a new TV programme name '' Zokko!''. It is regarded as the first children's "television comic".''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...

'', 7 November 1991, p.35 It ran on Saturday mornings for 26 episodes between 1968 and 1970. She was a strong supporter of BBC children's programmes and she objected strongly to the BBC buying the rights to the US produced ''

Sesame Street ''Sesame Street'' is an American educational children's television series that combines live-action, sketch comedy, animation and puppetry. It is produced by Sesame Workshop (known as the Children's Television Workshop until June 2000) ...

''. The programme had many admirers but Cox knew that important programmes such as ''Play School'' would need to be sacrificed if the BBC was to pay the large fee to license the programme for broadcast in the UK. Cox died in the

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at the age of 66.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cox, Molly 1925 births 1991 deaths British expatriates in Egypt British women television producers British television producers British expatriates in Turkey