W Stephen Gilbert writes: I first met Alastair Reid (obituary, 10 September) in 1972 when I was a trainee script editor at the BBC and shadowing a Penelope Mortimer play called Three's One under his direction. It was an awkward beast, centred on therapy sessions in which the analyst (the dapper Fulton Mackay) went unseen. Alastair got away with it – as I would now reckon – in the way he did much else, for he was he was fleet of foot, always pulling an eye-catching trick if he thought a script was flagging.
When later in the 70s I wrote about television, especially drama, in the London listings magazine Time Out, I would refer to Alastair in print as Flash Harry, which made him roar with laughter. I was thinking particularly of how he applied his inventiveness in his ghastly, lurid, modish feature Baby Love (1968).His later work matured into something lucid, judicious and humane.
His beam and bonhomie lit up a room. If he entertained disobliging views of anyone, he kept them to himself.
Henry Scott-Irvine writes: Alastair Reid's feature films included Baby Love, now a highly regarded "cult classic" thriller, featuring Diana Dors, Dick Emery and Linda Hayden; The Night Digger (1971), an overlooked thriller from Joy Cowley's novel, with a screenplay by Roald Dahl; Something to Hide (1972), with Peter Finch, Shelley Winters and Hayden, another gem of a thriller; and Teamster Boss: The Jackie Presser Story (1992), much acclaimed at the time. A hugely talented artist, poet, writer and director, Alastair displayed tremendous kindness and decency.
