Henric Hirsch

Henric Hirsch was a Hungarian émigré who directed most of the Doctor Who television story The Reign of Terror. Although an experienced theatre director in Hungary and England, Hirsch had little experience of television. This caused friction between him and the cast, particularly with William Hartnell.

During camera rehearsals for the third episode, "A Change of Identity", Hirsch collapsed from nervous exhaustion. Production assistant Timothy Combe was too inexperienced to take over, so producer Verity Lambert had a new director come in at the last moment. Combe later recalled that John Gorrie was the replacement director, but Gorrie denied ever working on The Reign of Terror. (INFO: The Reign of Terror) Hirsch later recovered and directed the remaining three episodes, which went down much smoother.

Hirsch worked fairly steadily from about 1963 to 1973, during which his steadiest employment seems to have been on Crossroads and Emmerdale. Much of his directorial work was on one-off movies-of-the-week and anthology programmes such as.