Leigh Spence

Leigh Spence (July 7, 1938 - May 7, 2014) was a television director and producer who worked on Prisoner, A Country Practice and Home and Away for over a 35-year career. After getting his leaving certificate at Newtown Demonstrational High School, Leigh was employed by the ABC in 1958 as a studio hand, progressing within the organisation until he became a producer/director. Despite this, he resigned within a few years to start his own fashion business in Melbourne, a clothing shop called Basically Black. Then he trained as a chef before returning to the ABC as a floor manager. In 1965, Spence took a leave of absence to travel and get some experience in Britain. He worked as a production assistant on the cult series Thunderbirds and also This Week in Britain, a news magazine program with Noeline Pritchard that screened in Australia for many years before the evening news. Then Spence was off to the BBC, where he worked on children's shows Jackanory and Crackerjack, the police drama Dixon of Dock Green and music program Top of the Pops. On his return to Australia, a position of production assistant was created for Spence by Sydney's ABC and he found himself involved in the music shows GTK and Sounds Like Us, and the children's shows Mr Squiggle and Adventure Island.