soap opera central episode writers and directors

Tony Jordan, then a rookie writer on EastEnders, was brought in by Holland: he wrote Eldorado’s very first episode. The road to nowhere … signs on the Eldorado set. There would be Germans and Scandinavians around the place, but it would centre on the Brits who brought their country with them. It had the key ingredients of a good soap: a sense of real community, of claustrophobia and isolation. There was a competition, and a winner: EastEnders creator Tony Holland’s idea about expat Brits living in Spain. With the government breathing down its neck, the Beeb needed to add a cruise missile to its arsenal, in order to increase its market share, justify the licence fee, and perhaps its very existence. ITV had Coronation Street and Emmerdale, the BBC just EastEnders.

The early 90s saw peak ratings cold war between the superpowers. The BBC hasn’t commissioned an open-ended soap since. As in, be careful, it could all go Eldorado or we might have an Eldorado on our hands. Today the soap opera, said to have cost the BBC £10m, is synonymous with extravagant fiasco. Photograph: Fiona Hanson/PAĮldorado’s final episode was broadcast 25 years ago this week.

A £2m white elephant … Plaza Los Barcos, the set of Eldorado, which is now used for paintballing.

Soap opera central episode writers and directors