Formidable and forthright, a much loved TV director who bullied, barracked and swore with a sergeant major’s repertoire of colourful profanities, industry legend Diana Edwards Jones, has died. As ITN’s senior director she controlled immensely complex operations on special events like election specials from the production gallery – a task compared to “playing three-dimensional chess at Wimbledon pace over a marathon course”. According to a 1987 profile in the newsletter for former ITN staff, she was “the bully, the one they learnt from, the one they laughed with and were outraged by. But it was Di who got them through whatever had to be done.”
Born 13 December 1932 in Swansea, Wales, no birth time, she started as a studio assistant in 1955 and rose rapidly at a time women were a rarity in senior positions. She became mistress of the control room on News at 10 with Alistair Burnet, Reginald Bosanquet and Trevor MacDonald and puppet-master behind special events.
Having come across her professionally in her heyday, it is such a delight to see that her chart reflects perfectly her exuberantly unselfconscious personality. She had an outspoken Sagittarius Sun opposition a communicative, restless Gemini Moon squaring onto an expansive, enthusiastic Jupiter in Virgo. Her Mercury in equally candid Sagittarius was in a short-fused square to Mars in perfectionist Virgo tempered by a sensible sextile to Saturn. Her Mars was in a showbusiness conjunction to Neptune. Her charmingly persuasive Venus in Scorpio trine Pluto would allow her to get away with a good deal.
Her mould-breaking Uranus in Aries was not only in a disruptive square to Pluto it was on the focal point of a yod inconjunct Venus sextile Jupiter – making her wilful, contrary, independent-spirited and also a trailblazer. Her life could have been a chaotic mess but she found the ideal context for her need for constant excitement, change and complexity. There is no birth time but I would hazard a guess at a 10th house controlling Pluto which would put her communicative Sagittarius Sun in the journalistic 3rd house, her Moon in the 9th of foreign affairs and her individualistic Uranus in the 7th.
Old memories. I was working for STV in those days which being Scottish and all too aware of the risk of alcohol there was an absolute veto on anyone drinking before going on air – presenters or technical staff. Much to our surprise on going down to London to watch the big boys at work, we were startled to see them tucking into the brandy at lunchtime with a long working day ahead. Not a workplace culture that helped Reginald Bosanquet who would finish News at Ten with his wig askew slurring his way through the football results.
Her strength was in an almost superhuman ability to hold together a vastly complex technical operation and deliver it to TV screens with effortless efficiency. By the 1979 general election I had moved to the BBC and had seen the behind-the-scenes preparation for a mammoth set-up with outside broadcast units galore, which looked guaranteed to beat ITN hands down. In the event Di Edwards Jones running a tighter organisation with her usual exemplary control delivered, while the BBC having over-convoluted their set-up collapsed to much ignominy.
It feels like the good old days of the wild west and was fun though almost always hysterical. Astonishingly she made it work.
Despite her sex, I doubt the forthright and formidable Di Jones would make it now in the sterile world of woke media where straight-talking, a distaste for emotional button-pressing and impatience with sloppy standards would be deemed “inappropriate conduct in the workplace”. More’s the pity.
Thank you Marjorie, what a great character and memories. She sounds like she has out-of-bounds energy so I checked her declinations and she does indeed have a very OOB moon at 28n (like Oprah Winfrey). These people often smash through limits and what is expected of them and can be a bit Uranian in flavour. She also has a Mercury Rx giving her access to a non-linear path and approach to life.
I rectified her chart to 10:53 am, giving “Diana” on her Asc alond with Saturn,
administrative ability sextile MH, career. Uranus, TV is in her 3rd, communication.
Pluto in her 6th, work adds toughness while Mercury on her MH gives mental
capacity to organize groups, 11th House emphasis.
When she died trans Pluto was on her Asc, Solar Arc Uranus conjuncted
Pluto in her 6th H. of illness, Solar Arc Asc trined her 8th cusp, death, and
trans Jones conjuncted her IC of endings.
https://ibb.co/3MsyVWy