Leaver originally had aspirations on becoming a professional actor and following his National Service in Egypt he gained a scholarship to the prestigious Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art. Graduating in the 1950s he found work appearing in productions at the Embassy Theatre in London before deciding to make a sideways move into television production. He does have a couple of credited television appearances as an actor – A Publican’s Story (22nd November 1953) and The Running Tide (23rd August 1955), a BBC play which also starred future ‘Buddyboy’ actor Peter Halliday in the cast. Leaver is credited by his full name, Donald Leaver, in a small role as a sailor.
His first production role was as a floor manager at Granada in 1957 and by the end of the decade he had advanced to the level of director for the short-lived ITV franchise Television Wales and The West (TWW). He worked in this capacity on a range of programming including the music show Jazz Club and in 1959 he directed the franchise’s first drama production, Dance Date (2nd January 1959). On the strength of this production he was quickly headhunted by ABC and Sydney Newman to work on their drama output including Armchair Theatre and episodes of Police Surgeon, the precursor to The Avengers.
Leaver directed nine episodes of Police Surgeon in total starting with the second episode ‘Under the Influence…?’ (17th September 1960) and finishing with ‘The Bigger They Are’ (3rd December 1960). Leaver was a favoured director by the show’s producer, Leonard White. “He was an obvious choice to work on the programme’s successor, The Avengers, and it is a measure of White’s faith in the director’s abilities that Leaver was entrusted with directing the new series’ opening instalment.[1]”
In an audio commentary for the season three The Avengers episode ‘Man with Two Shadows’ Leaver described his feelings during this period: “I was quite terrified, because I hadn’t been with ABC long. I’d been picked up in the provinces, where I’d been working at TWW, and to come down to ABC to work with Sydney Newman was just the most amazing thing for me.[2]” Lever, alongside fellow director Peter Hammond, oversaw the majority of the first season of The Avengers often turning mundane scripts into exciting pieces of drama by using ambitious and unusual camera movements and framing. This can be considered to be even more impressive when you consider that the episodes were broadcast live. Leaver and Hammond helped to establish to look and style of the series thus ensuring its longevity.
Aside from The Avengers Leaver was given an episode of the Boris Karloff presented science fiction anthology series Out Of This World. ‘Vanishing Act’ (18th August 1962) starred Maurice Denham as a washed up magician who becomes an overnight sensation after a buying a vanishing box trick. However the magician cannot explain exactly where his assistants and objects go when they vanish in the box as they don’t return… For season three of The Avengers in 1963 Leaver would direct three episodes; ‘Man With Two Shadows’, ‘The Wringer’ and ‘Esprit De Corps’.
Leaver directed his first serial, Dimensions of Fear (5th January – 26th January 1963), a four-part science fiction thriller which saw a rural space research centre threatened by an alien menace. John Lucarotti and Berkely Mather wrote the script and the cast included Peter Vaughan, Peter Copley, Mark Eden and Bruce Montague. Leaver’s main body of work during 1964 was working in ABC’s celebrated drama anthology Armchair Theatre. Leaver would work on four episodes starting with ‘Always Ask for the Best’ (15th March 1964) a comedic tale of a love triangle written by actor Stephen Lewis who also starred in the production alongside Warren Mitchell. Lewis would later find fame playing Blakey in the sitcom On The Buses.
Leaver also oversaw the next episode, ‘Mug’s Game’ (29th March 1964) before following up with the episode ‘A Jug of Bread’ (17th May 1964) which is notable for giving John Hurt an early leading role. Written by ex-lorry driver Jack Malton, the play was originally performed by the Sheffield Repertory Company where that it was seen by Armchair Theatre producer Leonard White. The final Armchair Theatre episode to benefit from Leaver’s skills was ‘A Certain Kind of Silence’ (28th June 1964) which was slated by The Stage “This was one of those dreary plays in which everybody dislikes everybody else, proving it by words, gestures, looks and action. There didn’t seem to be a loving heart among them.[3]”
‘You Must Be Virginia’ (6th September 1964) was the first Armchair Mystery Theatre production that Leaver directed. This was a spin-off series from Armchair Theatre which concentrated on thriller and mystery based plays. For The Avengers’ fourth season Leaver supplied three episodes; ‘Dial A Deadly Number’, ‘The House That Jack Built’ and ‘How To Succeed…At Murder’.
Leaver was then given the first two episodes of a new detective series, Public Eye, created by Roger Marshall to direct; ‘All For A Couple of Ponies’ (23rd January 1965) and ‘Nobody Kills Santa Claus’ (30th January 1965). Leaver also took on the role of producer for the series following a dispute with ABC which prevented him from directing. Still under contract Leaver took on the producer role until the dispute was resolved and he was able to return to directing. He returned to the anthology series Armchair Mystery Theatre to oversee two more episodes – ‘The Welcome’ (4th July 1965) and ‘The Lodger’ (25th July 1965) – and towards the end of the year contributed to the main show, Armchair Theatre, with the episodes ‘A Cold Peace’ (18th December 1965), which reunited him with actor Ian Hendry who had starred in Police Surgeon, and ‘Easier in the Dark’ (22nd January 1966) which featured Hollywood star Shelley Winters in the cast. His next Armchair Theatre instalment was ‘The Match’ (30th April 1966) starring Lee Montague, Wanda Ventham and Barbara Lott.
During 1967 Lever committed himself to four more episodes of Armchair Theatre starting with ‘Easier in the Dark’ (25th February 1967) written by Robert Muller who would create the BBC horror anthology series Supernatural. A month later and Lever’s next episode of Armchair Theatre appeared, ‘Any Number Can Play’ (25th March 1967), a satire set in a future where everyone works a three-day week. His third instalment was ‘A World of Time’ (1st April 1967), which was another script from Robert Muller, and his final credit of the year for the series was ‘England My England’ (29th April 1967) which starred Paul Eddington and Rachel Gurney.
He also directed a single episode of the now sadly lost horror TV series Haunted which starred Patrick Mower. Leaver oversaw the sixth episode, ‘After the Funeral’ (23rd September 1967). Three days later his opening first episode of The Gamblers anthology series, ‘Read ‘em and Weep’ (26th September 1967), was transmitted. Lever then worked on a single episode of Armchair Theatre in 1968 directing the story ‘A Very Fine Line’ (9th March 1968) which starred Stephanie Cole, Michael Craig and Lesley Phillips. A highlight of his work during the 1960s has to be The Gold Robbers which follows Detective Chief Superintendent Craddock (Peter Vaughan) as he tracks down and brings to justice the criminals responsible for a five and half million gold bullion robbery. Leaver directed the opening episode, ‘The Great Bullion Robbery’ (6th June 1969), which featured the tense and complex bullion robbery itself. Leaver directed a further two episodes of the thirteen-part series – ‘Crack Shot’ (20th June 1969) and ‘The Big Spender’ (27th June 1969).
During 1972 Lever would direct three episodes of Man at the Top before moving onto his final episode of Armchair Theatre with ‘Whatever Became of Me?’ (29th August 1972) written by Roger Marshall, the creator of Public Eye. The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes was an anthology drama with each episode featuring a different central character solving a murder or mystery which ran for two seasons between 1971 and 1973. The idea was to adapt short stories written by contemporaries of Arthur Conan Doyle and Lever directed one episode for season two ‘The Mystery of the Amber Beads’ (16th April 1973). His other credits for 1973 take in the very first episode of the Holland based detective series Van Der Valk, ‘A Death by the Sea’ (29th August 1973), and five episodes of the live action Gerry Anderson series The Protectors for the second season.
Lever’s production ‘Double Exposure’ (14th February 1974) opened the fourth season of the police drama Special Branch. He then moved on to work on the offbeat detective series Zodiac, co-created by Jaqueline Davies and Roger Marshall. Apart from the episode, ‘The Cool Aquarian’ (4th March 1974), Lever would also direct the episode ‘Saturn’s Rewards’ (18th March 1974). Rooms was an afternoon drama series which presented weekly two-part stories of the various characters and couples who rent rooms in a boarding house. Leaver’s first contribution to the series was the story 'Bernard and Ginnie' (21st and 22nd January 1975). For the BBC Leaver then directed two episodes of Sutherland’s Law – ‘In at the Deep End’ (27th May 1975) and ‘No Second Chance’ (10th June 1975) which guest starred Simon MacCorkindale who the following year would take a lead role in the Beasts episode ‘Baby’.
Following his two Sutherland’s Law stories Leaver was assigned an episode of the anthology series Against the Crowd by ATV. This series also included Kneale’s ‘Murrain’ during its run though Leaver was given an episode written by Kingsley Amis, ‘We Are All Guilty’ (17th August 1975). HTV was the next ITV franchise to hire Leaver who delivered two episodes of the series Westway, a drama about a self-sufficient community, working on episode three, ‘A Growing Concern’ (12th May 1976) and episode four, ‘Happy Families’ (19th May 1976). Operation Patch was a seven-part Southern Television production set in England during 1805, in the weeks leading up to the Battle of Trafalgar, when the country was at war with France. As well as directing all seven episodes Leaver also acted as the programme’s producer, the first time he had taken on this role since two episodes of Public Eye back in 1965. Written by John Lucarotti and transmitted between 13th June and 25th July.
Leaver started 1977 with the transmission during January of seven episodes of the daytime drama series Rooms he had directed. He cast his old Beasts co-worker Michael Sheard in ‘Hazell and the Weekend Man’ (6th March 1978) and for the anthology series Scorpion Tales Leaver directed the second episode, ‘Killing’ (6th May 1978), from a script by Bob Baker and Dave Martin. Next was three episodes of The Famous Five for Southern TV for which Leaver also acted as a producer on the complete thirteen episode run. The Stage reviewed the series and singled Leaver out for praise: “Director/producer, Don Leaver, had clearly grasped the essence of the Famous Five and was skilful in creating and conveying a cohesive feeling among the young actors and preserving a sense of intrigue and mystery exclusive to the group.[4]”
It was back to the BBC next for the interesting proto-portmanteau drama Accident which told how a car crash impacted upon the people involved in it. Leaver was responsible for three episodes before returning to ATV to work on the anthology drama series Heartland which was a series of single dramas themed around love. Staying with the franchise, now rebranded as Associated Television, he next worked on Turtle’s Progress providing the opening episode of season two (20th May 1980) and episode three (6th May 1980) which was produced by his old Beasts colleague Nicholas Palmer. Sounding Brass was an ATV comedy drama and Leaver worked on three episodes which starred Brian Glover as Horace Gilbert Bestwick. The first episode directed by Leaver was episode three, ‘H.G. and the Battle of Waterloo’ (16th July 1980), and this was followed by episode four, ‘H.G. and the Takeover Bid’ (23rd July 1980) and episode five, ‘H.G. and the Indian Job’ (30th July 1980). Fellow Beasts director, Don Shaw, oversaw the remaining episodes of the series.
Leaver made a return to the horror genre with two episodes of the horror anthology series Hammer House of Horror. His two episodes bookended the series with the debut story ‘Witching Time’ (13th September 1980) and the final instalment ‘The Mark of Satan’ (6th December 1980). Next was another BBC detective series for Leaver as he travelled to Jersey to direct an episode of the debut season of Bergerac. ‘See You in Moscow’ (15th November 1981) had Bergerac getting involved in a spot of espionage with Russian spies.
Leaver’s main body of work for 1983 and 1984 was producing and directing thirteen episodes of the sitcom A Fine Romance as well as acting on director on the 1984 season. For his work on the series he was nominated for a 1984 BAFTA nomination in the category of Best Comedy Series along with BBC sitcoms Hi-De_Hi!, Last of the Summer Wine and Only Fools And Horses. The award was won by Hi-De-Hi!. The following year A Fine Romance was given a second nomination in the same category, this time losing out to The Young Ones. Leaver also directed four episodes for the second season of the computer crime thriller Bird of Prey for the BBC and four episodes of the series Mitch starring John Thaw as an investigative reporter.
The BBC series The Detective featured Tom Bell and Mark Eden as senior policemen. Leaver directed all five episodes of the series transmitted 10th May – 7th June 1985 and based on the 1977 novel of the same name by Paul Ferris. Bell played Commander Kenneth Crocker, head of Scotland Yard’s Special Intelligence Branch. Crocker was a moral and patriotic policeman who, on discovering a senior government minister is corrupt, finds his colleagues closing ranks to protect the politician. Crocker decides to investigate the corruption scandal by himself. Leaver later attempted to raise interest in a movie version of the series, but this came to nothing eventually.
Leaver made a return to the horror genre with two episodes of the horror anthology series Hammer House of Horror. His two episodes bookended the series with the debut story ‘Witching Time’ (13th September 1980) and the final instalment ‘The Mark of Satan’ (6th December 1980). Next was another BBC detective series for Leaver as he travelled to Jersey to direct an episode of the debut season of Bergerac. ‘See You in Moscow’ (15th November 1981) had Bergerac getting involved in a spot of espionage with Russian spies.
Leaver’s main body of work for 1983 and 1984 was producing and directing thirteen episodes of the sitcom A Fine Romance as well as acting on director on the 1984 season. For his work on the series he was nominated for a 1984 BAFTA nomination in the category of Best Comedy Series along with BBC sitcoms Hi-De_Hi!, Last of the Summer Wine and Only Fools And Horses. The award was won by Hi-De-Hi!. The following year A Fine Romance was given a second nomination in the same category, this time losing out to The Young Ones. Leaver also directed four episodes for the second season of the computer crime thriller Bird of Prey for the BBC and four episodes of the series Mitch starring John Thaw as an investigative reporter.
The BBC series The Detective featured Tom Bell and Mark Eden as senior policemen. Leaver directed all five episodes of the series transmitted 10th May – 7th June 1985 and based on the 1977 novel of the same name by Paul Ferris. Bell played Commander Kenneth Crocker, head of Scotland Yard’s Special Intelligence Branch. Crocker was a moral and patriotic policeman who, on discovering a senior government minister is corrupt, finds his colleagues closing ranks to protect the politician. Crocker decides to investigate the corruption scandal by himself. Leaver later attempted to raise interest in a movie version of the series, but this came to nothing eventually.
He was interviewed by The Stage in July 1985 were he was labelled as a director specialising in action orientated TV series though he declined to acknowledge the term instead “I like to think of myself as a jobbing director and I’ve been very fortunate that during the last five years I’ve had the chance to work with some excellent writers and producers.[5]”
Central Independent Television invited Leaver to direct a couple of episodes of the anthology series Unnatural Causes. The result were the stories ‘Hidden Talents’ (15th November 1986), featuring Tom Bell and Pat Phoenix and written by Lynda La Plante (who had acted in the Beasts episode ‘Special Offer’), and ‘Window, Sir?’ (29th November 1986) which was set in a barber’s shop in a Welsh town. The series also included a Nigel Kneale scripted instalment, ‘Ladies Night’.
Central Independent Television invited Leaver to direct a couple of episodes of the anthology series Unnatural Causes. The result were the stories ‘Hidden Talents’ (15th November 1986), featuring Tom Bell and Pat Phoenix and written by Lynda La Plante (who had acted in the Beasts episode ‘Special Offer’), and ‘Window, Sir?’ (29th November 1986) which was set in a barber’s shop in a Welsh town. The series also included a Nigel Kneale scripted instalment, ‘Ladies Night’.
Bust was a forgotten London Weekend Television comedy drama which was co-created by Philip Hinchcliffe and had a cast led by Paul Nicholas as a bankrupt businessman. Leaver helped launch the series by directing the first two episodes, ‘Write Off’ (4th September 1987) and ‘Hidden Assets’ (11th September 1987). Prime Suspect (7th and 8th April 1991) is possibly the most celebrated series of Leaver’s later career who acted as producer for the Granada Television mini-series. He was able to cast Tom Bell opposite Helen Mirren’s DCI Jane Tennison trying to investigate a series of murders whilst facing sexism and hostility from her male police colleagues. The series was an outstanding success with both viewers and critics and was nominated in nine BAFTA Awards categories, winning six including Best Drama Serial and Best Actor Awards for Tom Bell, Helen Mirren and Zoe Wannamaker. It was the crowning glory of Leaver’s career.
His follow up series was A Touch of Frost. Starring David Jason the series started in a low key style and quickly gained popularity due to Jason’s portrayal. Leaver acted as producer from the first episode and would continue in this role for fifteen episodes broadcast between 1992 and 1999. He also doubled up as director on four episodes including the first story ‘Care and Protection’ (6th December 1992), season two production ‘Stranger in the House’ (30th January 1994), season three instalment ‘No Refuge’ (22nd January 1995) and an episode of the fourth season, ‘Deep Waters’ (4th February 1996)
An Independent Man was a comedy drama featuring a post-Minder George Cole as an independent county councillor. The seven-part series was produced by Leaver, who also directed two episodes, broadcast June and July 1995. In between producing or directing episodes of Frost Leaver took up an offer to direct two episodes of the BBC’s Hetty Wainthropp Investigates. Leaver’s final directing credits where on two episodes of The Bill – ‘Cover Stories’ (16th November 1999) and ‘Search Me’ (25th May 2000). Leaver also appeared in front of the camera being interviewed about some of his past credits for several television documentaries including Without Walls – ‘The Avengers’ (14th January 1992), Drama Connections – ‘Prime Suspect’ (25th October 2005), Must See TV – ‘The Avengers’ (10th November 2005) and Super Sleuths – ‘A Touch of Frost’ (12th December 2006). Leaver passed away on 13th December 2015 aged 86. He was survived by his second wife, Tania Scott, and their two children as well as four children from his first marriage to Caroline Swinton.
An Independent Man was a comedy drama featuring a post-Minder George Cole as an independent county councillor. The seven-part series was produced by Leaver, who also directed two episodes, broadcast June and July 1995. In between producing or directing episodes of Frost Leaver took up an offer to direct two episodes of the BBC’s Hetty Wainthropp Investigates. Leaver’s final directing credits where on two episodes of The Bill – ‘Cover Stories’ (16th November 1999) and ‘Search Me’ (25th May 2000). Leaver also appeared in front of the camera being interviewed about some of his past credits for several television documentaries including Without Walls – ‘The Avengers’ (14th January 1992), Drama Connections – ‘Prime Suspect’ (25th October 2005), Must See TV – ‘The Avengers’ (10th November 2005) and Super Sleuths – ‘A Touch of Frost’ (12th December 2006). Leaver passed away on 13th December 2015 aged 86. He was survived by his second wife, Tania Scott, and their two children as well as four children from his first marriage to Caroline Swinton.
[1] Two Against The Underworld: The Collected Unauthorised Guide To The
Avengers Series 1 by Robert McGinlay, Alan Hayes and Alys Hayes. Hidden
Tiger Books 2015, page 81.
[2] DVD audio commentary for The Avengers episode ‘Man with Two
Shadows’, The Avengers – The Complete
Series 3, Optimum Releasing, 2010
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