Joe Ahearne

Joe Ahearne (born 23 November 1963) directed five episodes of Doctor Who in Series 1, making him the most prolific director of that series (and, by extension, of Christopher Eccleston's tenure as the Ninth Doctor).

He was born on the day that the first episode of Doctor Who (An Unearthly Child) was originally broadcast.

His first production, entitled Latin in a Dark Room, won the Edinburgh awards.

Career
Ahearne's career began when the short film Latin for a Dark Room won an award at the Edinburgh Festival in 1994, and shortly afterwards he began working for the independent television production company World Productions. Among his work for World were episodes of the 1997 series the BBC Two drama This Life, for which Ahearne wrote two and directed another three episodes, making him the only person to both write and direct episodes for the series.

His next major production for World was the six-episode Channel Four vampire series Ultraviolet, which Ahearne both wrote and directed. Ultraviolet was broadcast in 1998 to high critical acclaim, and has subsequently been released on both VHS and DVD. The series also ran on the Sci-Fi Channel in the United States, and the Fox Network in that country produced a pilot for their own version in 2001, although this did not lead to a series.

In 2002 Ahearne directed the pilot for the Big Bear Productions horror-fantasy drama Strange, written by Andrew Marshall and broadcast on BBC One. The pilot was successful enough for a series to be commissioned the following year, with Ahearne helming three of the six episodes, although the series was not a success and a second did not follow.

Doctor Who stories directed

 * Dalek
 * Father's Day
 * Boom Town
 * Bad Wolf
 * The Parting of the Ways