Irene Shubik was a British television producer and story editor, known for her contribution to the development of the single play in British television drama.
19 Facts About Irene Shubik
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Irene Shubik left the BBC in 1976, and subsequently produced the first season of Rumpole of the Bailey for Thames Television before joining Granada Television where she produced Staying On and devised The Jewel in the Crown.
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Irene Shubik wrote film scripts and a novel, The War Guest.
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Irene Shubik was born in 1929 in Hampstead, London to a Russian-born Jewish father Joseph Shubik, who worked for a Scottish textile company and a French Jewish mother, Sara.
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Unable to obtain work, she moved to the United States, visiting her brother, the economist Martin Irene Shubik, who was teaching at Princeton University.
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Irene Shubik was offered a twelve-month contract with the National Film Board of Canada but was unable to take up the position as both of her parents had become seriously ill.
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Irene Shubik contributed occasional scripts to documentary series such as Associated-Rediffusion's This Week before securing employment at ABC Weekend TV.
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When Sydney Newman was poached by the BBC to head up their drama department in late 1962, he invited Irene Shubik to join him.
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One of the best-received installments of Story Parade that Irene Shubik worked was an adaptation of Isaac Asimov's 1954 novel The Caves of Steel starring Peter Cushing.
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In parallel with producing the second season of Out of the Unknown, Irene Shubik produced Thirteen Against Fate, a series of adaptations of short crime stories by Maigret creator Georges Simenon broadcast between 19 June 1966 and 11 September 1966.
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However, Ednas writer Jeremy Sandford later wrote that Irene Shubik seemed to "sabotage" the effectiveness of the play influencing policy makers in her 1975 book on television drama by questioning the veracity of its content.
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Irene Shubik was cast at Shubik's insistence, while Mortimer had expressed a strong preference for Michael Hordern.
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Irene Shubik commissioned six new Rumpole scripts from John Mortimer with a view to making a series but a change of senior personnel in the BBC led to the project being put on hold.
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In late 1976, at the invitation of Verity Lambert, Irene Shubik departed the BBC for Thames Television and brought the Rumpole scripts with her.
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Irene Shubik produced the first season of Rumpole of the Bailey in 1978 and commissioned the scripts for the second.
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Irene Shubik left Thames for Granada Television, her professional relationship with Lambert having seriously deteriorated, where she was hired to produce an adaptation of Paul Scott's Raj Quartet.
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When Granada got cold feet about the scale of the project and the cost of filming in India, Irene Shubik suggested that she produce an adaptation of Scott's Staying On as a pilot.
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Irene Shubik was the author of Play for Today: The evolution of television drama, an autobiographical account of the development of the single play in British television which has become a standard reference work on the subject.
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In 1992, Irene Shubik was chairman of the judges for the Best Drama Serial category for that year's British Academy Television Awards.