Dead Celebrity Alert

Johnny Byrne was one of the most prolific and best respected TV and screenwriters of our time. He wrote for many of British television’s classic series, including All Creatures Great and Small and Doctor Who. As well as writing, he created the hugely successful rural policing drama Heartbeat. …

In 1971 he got his first taste of screenwriting with the TV movie Season of the Witch, and in 1972 scripted the Spike Milligan biopic Adolf Hitler: My Part in His Downfall. Byrne now engaged full-time in what was to be his lifelong occupation as a writer of TV drama series including Doctor Who, Space 1999, Love Hurts, One by One, Tales of the Unexpected, Noah’s Ark and Heartbeat — a series he created. But perhaps he will be best remembered for his long involvement in the much-loved TV vet series All Creatures Great and Small, for which he was story consultant and wrote some 30 episodes. …

Johnny Byrne, television screenwriter, was born in 1935. He died of cancer on April 2, 2008, aged about 77 … Read full obituary

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