Movie to be made about TV inventor

THE story of TV inventor, John Logie Baird, is to be made in to a feature-length film.

The Scottish engineer, who died in 1946, aged 57, was the first in the world to demonstrate a working television – in January 1926 at his laboratory in London’s Soho.

Just two years later, he presented the first colour transmission.

JLB’s son, Malcolm, is to consult on the movie, alongside Jan Leman, writer and director of the BBC documentary, JLB – The Man Who Saw The Future. It’s to be made by Firefly Films, who are behind the upcoming Boogie Woogie and Beslan.

Says Malcolm: “The family of John Logie Baird is delighted that Firefly is going ahead with a film project based on my father. Television has had a huge impact and my father’s life was full of drama on the technical, personal and business sides, so we’re looking forward to the film’s development.”

Adds Jan: “I began researching the life of JLB in the early 1990’s and decided there was little point in attempting to dramatise his incredible story until the facts were properly gathered.

“Over the next decade, alongside expert researchers led by Malcolm Baird, much of the accepted wisdom about JLB was rightfully challenged, and found to be wanting. What has been revealed is far more dramatic than anything you could ever make up.

“JLB was a quiet, driven, scientific genius who overcame extraordinary obstacles to achieve an astonishing 178 patents in a 20-year career that lie at the heart of every major technology you can think of.”

The film is to to be based on the biography, John Logie Baird: A Life, by Malcolm Baird and Antony Kamm, and there is already speculation as to who might be cast in the lead role.

Filming is not due to start until the year after next.