Behind the Scenes
Mal Young: EastEnders' Guiding Light
By Larry Jaffee
LONDON-Visitors to the office of Mal Young, the BBC's Controller of Continuing Drama Series, encounter a shelf of classic American television memorabilia, such as a mini Twilight Zone TV set and Flintstones figurines.
Of the latter, Young quips as only a television executive would: "The birth of Pebbles got one of the biggest ratings ever, 60 million!"
The Walford Gazette's visit was a long-awaited chance to interview and thank in person a BBC executive who has been very supportive of this newspaper's endeavors in keeping EastEnders alive in the states.
Young oversees EastEnders, along with 13 other programmes. When he first arrived at the BBC six years ago, he restructured the division so that EastEnders, and also another popular show, Casualty, were at the centre of everything that was produced.
Young concurs with me that EastEnders is often not given enough credit as drama, and too often dismissed as nothing more than a "soap opera."
The Liverpool native was well familiar with the genre, having spent 12 years, starting in the early 1980s working in every job at one time or another for Brookside, which launched on Channel 4 in November 1982, a few years ahead of EastEnders. Brookside was praised for tackling tough issues, such as child abuse and rape, and received notoriety for a lesbian kiss.
The BBC was obviously paying attention. Nearly two years in development, EastEnders launched in February 1985.
"Oh, I remember the night. I certainly can-you know, everyone remembers where they were when Kennedy was shot and when Diana died," reminisces Young.
"I remember where I was when EastEnders first came on the air, and we were very nervous, because Brookside in those days was very hard-hitting, very different. It was-we called it, and the media agreed with us-the 'soap for people with brains,' uncompromising. You know, it was good. And, you know, I used to try to make it for people who didn't want to watch TV.
"So when we heard that the BBC was making EastEnders, we were kind of resting on our laurels and thought they're going to take something from us. It made us much more competitive because until then we hadn't needed to be.
"[EastEnders] was a soap that was going to be on a mainstream channel. We were on Channel 4, a very niche audience. And so [the BBC] enabled us to be more controversial. While they did it in the mainstream, we would write the kind of story that no one had ever done before-kill someone and put the body under the back patio. So I think actually EastEnders' existence made us [Brookside] think bigger."
Of his years working for Mersey TV, which produced Brookside for Channel 4, Young comments: "It was just a very concentrated amount of great on-the-job training. So 12 years later I found myself running the company and producing. I've got the job I love, but you become very insular, you think this is your world, this is the only world, and particularly Liverpool, you know, we think we run the world anyway."
While working for Mersey TV, Channel 4 gave Young a development deal to make his own shows. "So I devised a show called The Beat Goes On, set in Liverpool in 1960. We know about the Beatles, but what about the other 600 bands that were in the Liverpool in 1959? It was a drama about those bands. That was a big success."
Greg Dyke (BBC director-general, the highest position within the organisation), contacted Young and told him that he was setting up a new company (which was to become Channel 5), and acquiring other television production companies, including Thames and Grundy. He put together "a massive infrastructure, and he asked me to set up a drama department. That was seven years ago. Eventually my life changed over a weekend."
Young moved to London, and created for Channel 5 a show called Family Affairs. He also developed and pitched dramas to the BBC on behalf of Pearson.
"I was here at the BBC's White City programming headquarters] pretty well every week," he recalls. The BBC offered him a full-time job, "and that was it. I felt really awful having to say to Greg, 'I'm going to leave.' He was so supportive and said, 'It's the best thing you could do. You never know, I might join you.' A year later, he did. It's just so cool. So that's how I got here."
Young relished the thought of helping guide EastEnders. "I made my name making popular dramas. When I got to this department, I decided to put the two biggest shows [Casualty is the other] at the centre. The biggest show, EastEnders is [made] 17 miles away at the [BBC Elstree] studio. Although it's still physically 17 miles away, it's in our hearts and minds. The trick behind a successful soap-don't employ anyone there who doesn't believe passionately in it."
Young devised an incentive plan that required the creative staff to spend two years working on EastEnders and Casualty, after which the writers, directors and producers were promised a shot at developing their own shows. The strategy has helped the BBC keep their creative staff happy with new challenges. Young believes that everyone-the employees, the BBC and the viewers-benefit from the resulting talent pool.
"The lead writer from Casualty spawned all these other things."
Young says he's most proud of EastEnders' recent storylines of domestic violence and incest.
So who's Young's favourite EastEnders character?
"I probably get asked that the most throughout my whole career. I tend to diplomatically say, 'All the actors are very insecure,' so I never tell. I tend to be proud of the whole show."
Young works closely with EastEnders' creative team "to make sure we don't rest on our laurels. I think we've probably been through the best years in the life of the show ever, quality-wise. It's gone through ups and downs. There have been peaks before-Den and Angie were great. But quality-wise, I think what John [Yorke] and [long-time EE writer] Tony Jordan did in those two years, the impact on the screen of the shows, we're now building on that."
With 14 shows under his responsibility, Young admits that he's not involved in EastEnders on a daily basis. He's generally focused on future strategy, and every six months EastEnders gets his undivided attention to plan the show's direction.
As an example of his involvement, five years ago it was Young's idea to cast Martin Kemp as Steve Owen as the new bad guy on EastEnders, based on the actor's performance in the film The Krays.
About four times a year, Young says he must pull rank and ask the EastEnders team to go back and edit a show because it might be too violent.
He resents about the negative criticism government and watchdog agencies sometimes mount regarding EastEnders.
"We have to be careful. TV always is about easy scapegoats. These watchdogs, these committees, these commentators, act as if we're not human beings. We care. My job on behalf of the BBC is to run their biggest chunk of drama. I wouldn't be doing my job properly if I just kind of dismissed the audience in a cynical way. You have to challenge the audience and give them the best drama possible, but you keep to the rules. Just to break all the rules all the time-no point. I'd rather put on a very hard- hitting episode of EastEnders that asks questions about incest. We've done it. It's much more worthy than it if was tucked away in a documentary at 11 o'clock at night.
"Crime's on the increase, and it's our responsibility to reflect that. So is it chicken and egg? Are we holding the mirror of society? And this is how you are. We reflect, we follow the trends."
The BBC recently conducted consumer focus group research on what they liked and didn't like about EastEnders.
In response to whether the Walford Gazette may publish any of the findings, Young quips, "If you give me a lot of money! (Laughs) No. I mean that's probably the most sensitive information around, isn't it?"
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