Dennis Spooner - The ITC Years

The ITC Years

The move to The Baron was the start of Spooner's second and more creative period with ITC. Starting in 1967, he became a sort of "contracted freelancer": he was obliged to write 10 episodes a year for ITC, but he was not exclusively bound to the company.

After The Baron fizzled on ABC in America, the show ended its run in Britain. Spooner then turned to an old friend, the television writer Richard Harris, to help him in creating a new venture, Man in a Suitcase. The more significant partnership of 1967, however, was with an ITC producer, Monty Berman, with whom Spooner launched a production company called Scoton Productions. Between 1967 and 1971 Berman and Spooner created The Champions, Department S, its spin-off Jason King, and Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased). None of these programmes lasted more than two seasons, yet they all survived in the public memory long enough to justify video and DVD releases decades later. Indeed, Hopkirk was reimagined by television producers in 2000 for a two-series run. Spooner's time with these programmes betrayed not just an overwhelming interest in spy fiction, but also a penchant for rewarding friendship. Many former writing partners, including Tony Williamson and Richard Harris, returned to work on Spooner's ITC creations.

Despite his heavy involvement with ITC, Spooner also availed himself of the non-exclusivity of the arrangement. From the late 1960s to the early 1970s he continued to submit scripts to the BBC and ITV. This allowed him to be one of the most prolific writers on The Avengers during the Tara King era, and to successfully submit scripts to Paul Temple and Doomwatch.