stories, past and present. His aunt Lou Beale came to inspire the EastEnders character of the same name, along with her two children Peter (Pete) and Pauline. Holland also used some of his experiences as a barman in London's pubs and clubs to create the dynamic pairing of Den and Angie Watts, the owners of the Queen Victoria public house. Holland worked on EastEnders for four years, initially as script-editor and going on to script many episodes himself. After four years, Holland and Smith decided to leave EastEnders together in 1989 following a dispute with BBC bosses as to whether the character of Den Watts (played by Leslie Grantham) could return to the series following his exit in February of that year after being shot and supposedly killed. The character would ultimately return to the soap in 2003, having survived the shooting despite being presumed dead. On his departure from EastEnders in 1989, Holland was approached by Ireland's national broadcaster RTÉ to give their new urban soap opera Fair City its structure and story-lines for the first season. In 1991, Holland and Smith were hired by the BBC to produce Eldorado, loosely based around the lives of expats in Spain. Their new soap opera was launched in July 1992, but, plagued by a string of on- and off-screen problems, it received little of the success of EastEnders, and was axed a year later, in July 1993, despite a radical overhaul and improving ratings. In 2001, Holland was awarded a Special Achievement Award from The British Soap Awards; and in 2004, he appeared on the Channel 4 documentary How Soaps Changed The World. Personal life Holland entered into a civil partnership with Paul Wade in May 2007. Holland died on 28 November 2007, aged 67, after a long illness. The following day's edition of EastEnders was dedicated to him. References External links Obituary in The Times, 1 December 2007 Family tree 1940 births 2007 deaths 20th-century English screenwriters 20th-century LGBT people 21st-century LGBT people English soap opera writers English television writers English gay actors English gay writers British LGBT screenwriters People from Shoeburyness British male television writers