History of East Enders - 2000s

2000s

John Yorke then became the Executive Producer of EastEnders in 2000. During his time, York was given the task of introducing the soap's fourth weekly episode and managed a win over long running rival Coronation Street in a rare head-to-head showdown. He axed the majority of the Di Marco family and helped introduce popular characters such as the Slater family. As what Mal Young described as "two of EastEnders most successful years", Yorke was responsible for big ratings winners such as "Who Shot Phil?", Ethel Skinner's death, Jim Branning and Dot Cotton's marriage, abusive Trevor Morgan, and Kat Slater's revelation to her daughter Zoe that she was her mother. Yorke was also responsible for the recasting of Sam Mitchell in January 2002.

The Queen and Prince Philip visited the set in 2001 and were shown around by actresses Wendy Richard and Barbara Windsor.

In 2002, Louise Berridge succeeded John York as the Executive Producer. During her time at EastEnders, Berridge introduced characters such as Alfie Moon, Dennis Rickman, Chrissie Watts, Jane Beale, Stacey Slater and the critically panned Indian Ferreira family. The Ferriera family also received criticism from the Asian community, who branded their storylines unbelievable and poorly researched, referencing the family's apparent mix of Muslim, Christian and Hindu characters. Also in 2002 and 2003 she wrote out top characters like Mark Fowler played by Todd Carty who had been in the show for over a decade, Lisa Fowler played by Lucy Benjamin who was one of the shows top characters at the time and also the Evans family which included Barry, Natalie & Roy.

Berridge was responsible for some ratings success stories, such as the Alfie/Kat love storyline, "Janine kills Barry", Jamie Mitchell's death and the return of one of the greatest soap icons, "Dirty" Den Watts who had been presumed dead for fourteen years. His return in late 2003 was watched by over 16 million viewers, putting EastEnders back at number one in the rating war with the ITV's rival soap Coronation Street. However, other storylines, such as a storyline about a kidney transplant involving the Ferrieras, were not well received, and although Den Watts' return proved to be a ratings success, the British press branded the plot unrealistic and felt that it questioned the show's credibility. A severe press backlash followed after Den's actor, Leslie Grantham, was outed in an internet sex scandal, which coincided with a swift decline in viewer ratings. The scandal led to Grantham's departure from the soap, however the occasion was used to mark the 20th anniversary of EastEnders, with an episode showing Den's murder at the Queen Vic pub.

On 21 September 2004 Berridge quit as executive producer of EastEnders following continued criticism of the show. The following day the programme received its lowest ever ratings (6.2 million) when ITV scheduled an hour long episode of its rival soap, Emmerdale, against it. Emmerdale was watched by 8.1 million people. Kathleen Hutchison was swiftly appointed as the Executive Producer of EastEnders, and was tasked with quickly turning the fortunes of the soap. During her time at the soap Hutchison axed multiple characters, and reportedly ordered the rewriting of numerous scripts. Newspapers reported on employee dissatisfaction with Hutchison's tenure at EastEnders. New characters introduced by Hutchison included Jake Moon, Danny Moon, Johnny Allen and Ruby Allen. In January 2005, Hutchison left the soap and John York (who by this time, was the BBC Controller of Continuing Drama Series) took total control of the show himself and became acting Executive Producer for a short period, before appointing Kate Harwood to the role.

Harwood stayed at EastEnders for 20 months before being promoted by the BBC. During her time at the soap Harwood introduced the characters of Dawn Swann, Honey Edwards, Deano Wicks, Carly Wicks, Kevin Wicks, Shirley Carter, Chelsea Fox, Sean Slater, Denise Fox, Libby Fox, Bradley Branning, Max Branning and Tanya Branning. These characters replaced the likes of Chrissie Watts, Dennis Rickman, Sharon Rickman, Little Mo Mitchell and most notably, original character Pauline Fowler. Wendy Richard, who played Pauline commented that her decision to leave EastEnders had been taken after the storyline involving Pauline's marriage to Joe Macer. Richard felt that this storyline, along with Pauline's development into a miserable manipulator had devalued the original creation of the character.

On Friday 11 November 2005, EastEnders was the first British drama to feature a two minute silence. This episode later went on to win the British Soap Award for 'Best Single Episode'.

In October 2006, Diederick Santer took over as Executive Producer of EastEnders. He introduced several characters to the show, including ethnic minority and homosexual characters to make the show 'feel more 21st Century'. Characters he introduced included Zainab Masood, Masood Ahmed, Christian Clarke, Whitney Dean, Tiffany Dean, Ronnie Mitchell, Roxy Mitchell, Archie Mitchell, Jack Branning, Heather Trott, Lucas Johnson, Ryan Malloy, Syed Masood and Amira Shah. Santer has also reintroduced past and popular characters to the programme including Bianca Jackson, Ricky Butcher, Janine Butcher, Sam Mitchell, Liam Butcher, Owen Turner, Liz Turner, Carol Jackson and Billie Jackson. Robbie Jackson and Sonia Fowler returned for a week of episodes to mark EastEnders 25th anniversary, while Santer also reinstated Diane Butcher for a week of episodes in 2008, and brought back the characters of Clare Bates and Steven Beale for a period of a few months.

On 2 March 2007, BBC signed a deal with Google to put videos on YouTube. A behind the scenes video of EastEnders, hosted by Matt Di Angelo, formerly Deano Wicks on the show, was put on the site the same day, and was followed by another on 6 March 2007. In April 2007, EastEnders became available to view on mobile phones, via 3G technology, for 3, Vodafone and Orange customers. On 21 April 2007, the BBC launched a new advertising campaign using the slogan "There's more to EastEnders". The first television advert showed Dot Branning with a refugee baby, Tomas, whom she took in under the pretence of being her grandson. The second and third featured Stacey Slater and Dawn Swann, respectively. There have also been adverts in magazines and on radio.

In 2009, producers introduced a limit on the number of speaking parts in each episode due to budget cuts, with an average of 16 characters per episode. The decision was criticised by Martin McGrath of Equity, who said "Trying to produce quality TV on the cheap is doomed to fail." The BBC responded by saying they had been working that way for some time and it had not affected the quality of the show.