As executive producer on His Dark Materials, Joel Collins helped steer one of the most ambitious fantasy series ever created for the BBC to worldwide acclaim. As the EP on Doctor Who, he’s part of the team taking the beloved sci-fi juggernaut to new global heights.
He’s had multiple award nominations and has BAFTA-wins under his belt but his cool credits go further still, encompassing work on Black Mirror, The Day Of The Triffids, the 2005 film of The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy and even Muppet Treasure Island. Oh, and just some music videos with the likes of Madonna and Pet Shop Boys.
Now he’s dealing with the likes of Janis Goblin and a whole new series of adventures that he promises will blow viewers away – that is, if he can remember which corner of the Whoniverse he’s working in at any given moment…
How is life in the world of Doctor Who for you?
◆ Making this many episodes concurrently is extraordinarily complicated. Because from our perspective, Phil [Collinson, executive producer], myself, Jane [Tranter] and Julie [Gardner, producers] and Russell, we obviously are in there from the early days of its development with Russell’s scripts, which are always amazing and so fluid. I kind of see them like bouncy balls, you’re watching a ball bounce because they never falter. You just see it go from beginning to end and it’s just impressive. But we obviously have to then work out, “How do we make it?” and all that stuff. Then we find the crew and the director and the designer – we’ve got Phil [Sims], who’s amazing. So with all of this stuff, it takes its time.
