Who played John Wilder in TV's The Plane Makers?
The Plane Makers management themselves. Patrick Wymark proved particularly popular as the anti-heroic Managing Director John Wilder, who was "a bully and a boor", who "is forgiven only if he gets results" . Wilder's nemesis in the boardroom in the third series was David Corbett (Alan Dobie), though he was supported by his long-suffering wife Pamela (Ann Firbank, standing in for Barbara Murray from series 2), his Sales Director and confidant Don Henderson (Jack Watling) and ever-reliable secretary Miss Lingard (Norma Ronald). In the first two series their task was to manufacture and sell their aircraft, the Sovereign, to an international market. In
The Plane Makers series 3, Wilder unexpectedly changed strategy to a military VTOL jet aircraft, by taking over the firm of Ryan Airframe. According to one report, it was on Gretorex's advice that the drama "left the factory floor for the executive suite" . At the end of the final "Plane Makers" series in January 1965, Wilder left Scott Furlong after a project for the Scott-Furlong Predator, a vertical takeoff aircraft, had failed, and took a seat on the board of a merchant bank while also collecting a knighthood . He returned eleven months later in "The Power Game". Bored of being a