- Born
- Height6′ 1″ (1.85 m)
- Ian Levine was born on June 22, 1953 in Blackpool, Lancashire, England, UK. He is a composer and producer, known for The Northern Soul Story (2000), Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass (2027) and Doctor Who and the Shada Man (2013).
- He is often credited as an influential figure in bringing to an end the BBC's policy in the 1970s of wiping episodes of Doctor Who (1963) and other popular series. In 1978 he discovered The Dead Planet (1963) at BBC Enterprises, where it was marked for destruction. By this time, the BBC had already purged hundreds of episodes of Doctor Who (1963), but the BBC ended the policy the same year and established a new archiving policy which preserved all episodes the BBC had left and enabled future repeat showings, as well as commercial releases on video cassette and DVD.
- The characterization of the Abzorbaloff monster played by Peter Kay in Love & Monsters (2006) was based on Levine and reflects his role in fandom.
- He is a big fan of the television series Doctor Who (1963) and collected numerous rarities and items of memorabilia connected to the series. He was also used by producer John Nathan-Turner in the 1980s as an advisor on continuity for the series.
- Levine has been an enthusiast for television since he was young and in the 1970s he owned one of the early domestic video recorders, a Philips N1500. He used this to make numerous recordings from television, some of which are now rarities. Some of his rare recordings have been used for Doctor Who (1963) DVD releases, such as the appearance of Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen on Multi-Coloured Swap Shop (1976) in 1976, an episode which the BBC did not keep a copy of, and the restoration of the original cliff-hanger to The Deadly Assassin: Part Three (1976), which was edited from the BBC's original master tape after a complaint from Mary Whitehouse.
- In July 2017, he announced that Chris Chibnall had put "the final nail into Doctor Who" by giving the character a sex change and he wanted "nothing more to do with it".
- Doctor Who (1963) had eight producers up until 1979. There were always fresh ideas coming in. But in 1980, Nathan-Turner took over and kept going right until the bitter end in 1989. I just hate everything he did to Doctor Who (1963). He's a light entertainment producer and he was inspired by Morecambe (Eric Morecambe) and Wise (Ernie Wise), so he kept putting in guest-stars - Joan Sims, Nicholas Parsons, Beryl Reid... Hale (Gareth Hale) and Pace (Norman Pace)! That really was the final straw. John Nathan-Turner is the man who single-handedly killed Doctor Who (1963).
- [on the gay scene] I've never seen such a beautiful scene decimated. It was heart-breaking.
- Acts like Lady Gaga leave me cold because they cynically target a gay audience just as an extra selling point and the music is soulless to me.
- [on the Doctor's sex change in 2017] Chris Chibnall makes me want to vomit. He has put the final nail into Doctor Who (2005).
- [on the casting of Jodie Whittaker as the first woman Doctor] This is really shit - it sucks - it's stupid - kills the show. I want nothing more to do with it.
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