Toby Haynes began his directorial career on Doctor Who with the series 5 finale, The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang. He returned to direct the first episode — from a production perspective — of series 6, the 2010 Christmas special and the two-part opener, The Impossible Astronaut/Day of the Moon. This made Haynes the first person in the history of Doctor Who to direct three consecutively broadcast television stories.
He is a longtime friend of the cinematographer of the series 5 finale, Stephan Pehrsson, with whom he went to film school. (CON: Alien Abduction)
Haynes' career began in 2003 with the short film Lost and Found. His next project, a 2004 episode of Coming Up, earned him a nomination from the Director's Guild of Great Britain for outstanding achievement in short film. In 2007, he began to direct more mainstream television programmes, first by helming an episode of Hollyoaks. He then began an association with the production company Kudos, the same production company that produced the Life on Mars franchise and employed Piers Wenger and Beth Willis. He directed several episodes of the kids' espionage programme, M.I. High and then moved on to other Kudos projects, Spooks: Code 9, starring Georgia Moffett and Holby Blue. In 2009, he branched away from the Kudos stable to direct the first two episodes of Toby Whithouse's Being Human. Just prior to working on Doctor Who, he helmed three episodes of the second series of the police procedural, Five Days, starring David Morrissey. He has also directed six episodes of Andor which featured actors Christopher Fairbank and Faye Marsay.
