Tony Jordan
British television writer (born 1957)

Tony Jordan (born 21 July 1957) is a British television writer. For many years, he was lead writer and series consultant for BBC One soap opera EastEnders. He has written over 250 episodes for the programme since 1989, including the 2008 single-hander "Pretty Baby....". He created the series Hustle, HolbyBlue, City Central, Moving Wallpaper, Echo Beach, The Nativity, The Passing Bells and Dickensian, and co-created Life on Mars and By Any Means.
Career
Beginning his career as a market trader, Jordan began writing at the age of thirty-two. He joined EastEnders after sending a spec script to the BBC about market traders, with a covering letter saying he had been born and raised in the East End of London. The BBC turned down the spec script, but gave him a job on EastEnders because of his apparent life experience. Afraid of what would happen if the producers found out that he was from the north, Jordan kept up the pretence of being a Londoner for five years.
Jordan left school with no qualifications. For his work on EastEnders, he is particularly known for creating the Slater family along with then-producer, John Yorke.
The public source identifies “Tony Jordan” as british television writer (born 1957). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Tony, Jordan and British.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3531791. VIAF identifies the subject as 68703946. The Library of Congress control number is no2007029798. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1957, 1989 and 2008.
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This entry incorporates text from “Tony Jordan” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.