Alexander Waugh has been passionate about pianos ever since he was a small boy. Fuelled by an insatiable curiosity about the roots of his musical addiction, he sets out in search of other like-minded piano-obsessives to discover what it is about this instrument that has the power to turn seemingly rational people into compulsive lifelong piano junkies.
Framed and punctuated by Alexander's effort to teach a novice to play the piano in a week, the film follows him on his quest around the concert halls and homes of classical and pop pianists like Paul Lewis, Jools Holland and Damon Albarn as well as a wide range of enthusiastic amateurs, including a child prodigy, a pilot and a national newspaper editor.
A new Royal Shakespeare Company production for 2022 of one of Shakespeare's best-loved romantic comedies, filmed in Stratford-upon-Avon. In a colourful world where anything feels possible, two very different couples fall in love. With dastardly plots, hilarious slapstick and some of Shakespeare’s wittiest dialogue, Roy Alexander Weise directs this classic tale of matchmaking and manipulation.
From the silent days of cinema, Shakespeare's plays have often been adapted to the big screen. Film-makers relished his vivid characters and dramatic plots as well as the magic and poetry of his work.
At first the results were patchy, then came Laurence Olivier. With Henry V, made to stir patriotic spirit during the Second World War, he perfectly translated Shakespeare from the stage to the screen. He followed Henry V with Hamlet, and both were smash hits. Olivier led the way for directors as diverse as Orson Welles, Kurosawa, Franco Zeffirelli, Roman Polanski, Baz Luhrmann and Kenneth Branagh.
The Bard's language has been no barrier, with bold versions of his dramas coming out of Russia, Japan, India and many other countries, not to mention Hollywood's free adaptations in genres as diverse as musicals and science fiction. Already over 30 films worldwide have been produced based on Romeo and Juliet alone.
For the first time in a single documentary, Arena explores the rich, global history of Shakespeare in the cinema, with a treasure trove of film extracts and archival interviews with their creators.
Sir Cameron Mackintosh was once a theatre stagehand on Drury Lane and is now a musical theatre impresario, with a career spanning 50 years and a catalogue of musical theatre hits to his name - including Cats, Les Miserables, Phantom of the Opera and Miss Saigon - and he is now about to launch the US hit musical Hamilton in London.
Alan Yentob meets Cameron Mackintosh to discover how a timber merchant's son with a passion for song and dance, an abundance of ambition and a keen eye for detail became the most successful man in the musical theatre business and in the process changed the face and sound of musical theatre across the globe.
The Hereford Mappa Mundi is the largest intact Medieval wall map in the world and its ambition is breathtaking - to picture all of human knowledge in a single image. The work of a team of artists, the world it portrays is overflowing with life, featuring Classical and Biblical history, contemporary buildings and events, animals and plants from across the globe, and the infamous 'monstrous races' which were believed to inhabit the remotest corners of the Earth.
The Mappa Mundi, meaning 'cloth of the world', has spent most of its long life at Hereford Cathedral, rarely emerging from behind its glass case. The programme represents a rare opportunity to get close to the map and explore its detail, giving a unique insight into the Medieval mind. This is also the first programme to show the map in its original glory, revealing the results of a remarkable year-long project by the Folio Society to restore it using the latest digital technology.
The map has a chequered history. Since its glory days in the 1300s it has languished forgotten in storerooms, been dismissed as a curious 'monstrosity', and controversially almost sold. Only in the last 20 years have scholars and artists realised its true depth and meaning, with the map exerting an extraordinary power over those who come into contact with it. The programme meets some of these individuals, from scholars and map lovers to Turner Prize-winning artist Grayson Perry, whose own work, the Map of Nowhere, is inspired by the Mappa Mundi.
The British Library is home to a staggering 4.5 million maps, most of which remain hidden away in its colossal basement, and the programme delves behind the scenes to explore some amazing treasures in more detail. This is the story of three maps, three 'visions' of London over three centuries; visions of beauty that celebrate but also distort the truth. It's the story of how urban maps try to impose order on chaos.
On Sunday 2 September 1660, the Great Fire of London began reducing most of the city to ashes, and among the huge losses were many maps of the city itself. The Morgan Map of 1682 was the first to show the whole of the City of London after the fire. Consisting of sixteen separate sheets, measuring eight feet by five feet, it took six years to complete. Morgan's beautiful map symbolised the hoped-for ideal city.
In 1746 John Rocque produced what was at the time the most detailed map ever made of London. Like Morgan's, Rocque's map is all neo-Classical beauty and clinical precision, but the London it represented had become the opposite. In engravings of the time, such as Night, the artist William Hogarth shows a city boiling with vice and corruption. Stephen Walter's contemporary image, The Island, plays with notions of cartographic order and respectability. His extraordinary London map looks at first glance to be just as precise and ordered as his hero Rocque's but, looking closer, it includes 21st-century markings, such as 'favourite kebab vans' and sites of 'personal heartbreak'.
MONDAY 04 APRIL 2022
MON 19:00 Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village (b0bsrqfw)
Series 1
North East
Archaeologist Ben Robinson unlocks the ancient roots of the Northumberland village of Warkworth. With the help of locals, he discovers clues that point back almost 1,000 years to the Norman conquest when the invaders laid the foundations of a planned community, still visible to this day.
MON 19:30 Inside Museums (m001645q)
Series 2
The Story of Slate
Huw Stephens tells the story of the Welsh slate industry with a visit to the National Slate Museum in Llanberis. It’s an extraordinary story of ruthless landlords exploiting whole mountains to make vast profits from what is now Snowdonia National Park.
Quarrying slate was a brutal business, and working conditions for the poorly paid men were extremely dangerous. In 1900, the longest industrial dispute in British history started with the Great Penrhyn Strike at the quarry in Bethesda – the biggest quarry in the world at the time. But despite the hardships and environmental damage to the landscape that can still be seen to this day, the slate industry created a unique culture of poetry, music and song in the Welsh language.
The National Slate Museum is housed within the old Gilfach Ddu workshops at Llanberis, a site that once provided all the tools and maintenance for the huge Dinorwig quarry just above the village. The whole museum is a living artefact. It looks and feels as if the workers have just downed tools and left for the day.
Huw meets Andrew ‘JonJo’, a sixth-generation quarryman who himself worked for 32 years at the Penrhyn quarry in Bethesda. Now he is a demonstrator, showing visitors the fine craft of slate splitting. He explains why, despite life as a quarryman being tough, he is proud of his heritage and how there was real camaraderie among the men. At its height in the late 19th century, the Welsh slate industry employed 14,000 men and produced nearly half a million tons of slate per year. Welsh slate was exported across the British Empire and beyond, and is still considered some of the best in the world.
Elen Roberts, head of the museum, shows Huw some of the industrial artefacts. The huge waterwheel, the biggest in mainland Britain, used water from Afon Hwch that flows off Eryri (Snowdon) just up the valley to power the workshops. They were almost self-sufficient, manufacturing everything you would need for the profitable extraction of slate, from wagons and railway sleepers to hammers and chisels.
Elen shows Huw the impressive foundry where complex metal components were cast from molten iron. And in the loft, Huw sees the thousands of wooden patterns that were carved by hand to create the moulds into which the iron was poured. Elen explains that all of this priceless heritage would have been lost were it not for the actions of the quarry’s former chief engineer Huw Richards Jones, who stopped the ‘vultures’ circling and started a campaign to preserve the workshops and the artefacts.
One of the museum’s most poignant exhibits is Fron Haul, a row of traditional terraced cottages that were moved stone by stone from nearby Tan Y Grisiau and rebuilt at Gilfach Ddu. The houses have been furnished to represent life at three different quarries at three different times: 1861, the height of the industry, at Tan Y Grisiau, Blaenau Ffestiniog; 1969, Llanberis, the year the Dinorwig quarry closed; and 1901, Bethesda, the middle of the Great Penrhyn Quarry Strike.
The museum’s chief curator, Cadi Iolen, shows Huw around the 1901 house explaining the significance of the sign in the window that reads ‘Nid oes bradwr yn y ty hwn’, which translates as ‘There is no traitor in this house’. During the strike, quarrymen would put these signs in the window to show that they were still out. The strike lasted three long years and tore the community apart. Inside, Cadi shows Huw a conch shell that strikers’ wives would blow like a trumpet to shame the strikebreakers as they returned from work. And upstairs in a tiny bedroom, Huw finds a suitcase with a luggage label for Tumble, a sign that the man of the house was leaving to look for work in the south Wales coalfields.
Life was hard for the quarrymen of north Wales, but the communities that grew up around the industry were resilient too and created a unique culture. At the heart of this was Y Caban, or The Cabin, a kind of hut out on the quarry face where the men would gather to eat their lunch, drink tea and discuss the important matters of the day. These meeting places have come to take on an almost mythical status in the culture of the quarry, turning into centres of learning and political debate where working men could find respite from the hardship of their working life.
Lowri Ifor, the museum’s education officer, shows Huw the Caban at the Gilfach Ddu Workshops, complete with an eisteddfod chair awarded to the best poet at a quarry eisteddfod in 1938. Although the slate industry left a legacy of environmental destruction and economic hardship, it also created a unique Welsh-speaking culture in the industrial villages in the mountains that nurtured writers, poets and politicians as well as brass bands and male voice choirs that still thrive to this day.
The slate landscapes of Gwynedd, and the culture they created, have been designated a Unesco World Heritage Site, putting them on a par with the Taj Mahal and the Great Pyramids.
MON 20:00 Neanderthals - Meet Your Ancestors (b0b4dffq)
Series 1
Episode 2
According to recent science the Neanderthals are not the knuckle-dragging apemen of popular imagination. In fact they are our distant ancestors. About 2% of the DNA of most people is of Neanderthal origin - and it continues to affect us today.
In this episode, Ella Al-Shamahi explores the fate of the Neanderthals - asking why they became extinct, and discovering how they live on inside of us today. The programme starts in the caves of Gibraltar, which may have been the last place the Neanderthals survived. Discoveries here have shown the Neanderthals lived a good life - feasting on seafood and wild game. These were a people who were supremely well adapted to their environment. But about 40,000 years ago they disappeared. Why? It wasn't because they were socially unsophisticated. Back in the studio we return to Ned - the scientific recreation of a Neanderthal we built in the first programme with the help of actor Andy Serkis and a team of scientific experts. In this episode, Andy helps us see Ned towards the end of his life. Ned's fossil shows that he had survived for many years after suffering a number of crippling injuries. This could only have happened if he had been cared for by the rest of his community. This was an advanced society that knew how to survive. So why did they disappear?
One of the reasons might have been that they lost out in a physical showdown with modern humans. Ella investigates one of the world's oldest murder mysteries. A Neanderthal skeleton found in the Shanidar cave in Iraq gives us clues to a gruesome death. In the studio Ella and her team of scientists reconstruct an experiment to discover whether the perpetrator of this murder was a Neanderthal or a modern human. There are other reasons why Neanderthals may have become extinct: their small population size, or climate change. But when their DNA was first decoded in 2010 it became clear that they hadn't completely disappeared - because they live on inside of us - everyone except people from sub-Saharan Africa. Ella meets scientists who reveal how our genetic legacy from Neanderthals may have made all the difference to our survival in Ice Age Europe and how today the DNA from our ancestors affects our skin, our immune system, our risk for cancer, and even certain neuro-psychiatric diseases such as addiction.
At the Pasteur Institute in Paris, Ella meets a scientist who explains how, once we know exactly what we have inherited from Neanderthals, we can use this information to develop new approaches to treating diseases such as the 'flu virus. But not all of our Neanderthal inheritance is necessarily good for us - it is possible that obesity and type 2 diabetes may have their roots in Neanderthal heritage. Finally, Ella explores a truly mind-blowing possibility that we could manipulate their DNA to bring a Neanderthal back to life. Individually many of us have around 2% Neanderthal DNA. But each person's 2% is different. It turns out that modern humans living today collectively have up to 70% of the Neanderthal genome walking around within us. It's enough that scientists have started contemplating bringing Neanderthals back from extinction.
MON 21:00 Ian Hislop's Fake News: A True History (m00095hv)
Fake news is never out of today's headlines. But in his latest documentary taking the long view of a hot-button issue, Ian Hislop discovers fake news raking in cash or wreaking havoc long before our own confused, uncertain times. Ian mines history to identify what motivates fake news - from profit, power and politics to prejudice, paranoia and propaganda – as well as to try to figure out what to do about it. In America and back home, Ian meets, amongst others, someone whose fake news stories have reached millions and a victim of fakery alleged to be a mastermind of the spurious paedophile ring ‘Pizzagate’ conspiracy. Viewers also get to see Ian doing something that has never been captured on film before – as he gets a taste of what it is like to be 'deepfaked'.
In 1835, New Yorkers were fooled by one of the most entertaining and successful fake news scoops of all time - a tale of flying man-bats spied on the moon through the world’s most powerful telescope. The moon hoax story ran in a cheap, new tabloid - The Sun. Within decades, a circulation war waged between two pioneering press barons - Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst - was seen by many as causing a real war, between America and Spain. Meanwhile, another American conflict, the Civil War of the 1860s, had proved that photography, which initially promised new standards of accuracy, also brought new ways of lying. Ian looks at the battlefield images of pioneering photojournalist Alexander Gardner, who achieved ends by means that would be judged unethical today. He also encounters the spooky 'spirit photography' of William Mumler.
Ian digs into one of the most pernicious conspiracy theories of all time - the protocols of the Elders of Zion. He is disturbed to find this virulently anti-Semitic tract available with one click and rave reviews on Amazon, despite comprehensive factual debunking a century ago. Ian also ponders the consequences of official British fake news-mongering. During WWI, lurid stories were spread about German factories manufacturing soap from corpses. But a consequence of such black propaganda was to undermine the currency of trust in government - rather like, Ian notes, the absence of WMDs in Iraq has more recently.
To understand more about the current crisis, Ian meets James Alefantis, owner of the Washington DC pizzeria who fell victim to the ‘Pizzagate’ conspiracy. He also quizzes ex-construction worker Christopher Blair, a controversial figure sometimes dubbed 'the godfather of fake news'. He discusses how frightened we should be about fake news, and what can be done about it, with Damian Collins MP who chaired the parliamentary inquiry into fake news.
Collins argues that today's tech giants – Facebook in particular - should be taking even more active steps to take down disinformation. But that path also has its perils, as Ian finds out when he resurrects the extraordinary story of Victoria Woodhull, a woman who sued the British Museum for libel in the 1890s. This pioneering American feminist - the first woman who ran to be president - was an early victim of what today would be termed 'slut-shaming'. But does combatting lies give anyone the right to censor the historical record and limit free speech?
MON 22:00 The Challenger (p00zstkn)
When the space shuttle Challenger blew up in 1986, it was the most shocking event in the history of American spaceflight. The deaths of seven astronauts, including the first teacher in space Christa McAuliffe, were watched live on television by millions of viewers. But what was more shocking was that the cause of the disaster might never be uncovered. The Challenger is the story of how Richard Feynman, one of America's most famous scientists, helped to discover the cause of a tragedy that stunned America.
MON 23:30 Tomorrow's Worlds: The Unearthly History of Science Fiction (p01yqkdq)
Space
Series in which historian Dominic Sandbrook explores the most innovative and imaginative of all genres - science fiction. He is joined by leading writers and film-makers, who tell the inside story of their best-known works.
In this first episode, Dominic looks at science fiction's enduring fascination with outer space, from Jules Verne's pioneering 19th-century vision of a voyage to the moon to the galaxy far, far away of Star Wars.
Along the way we learn what Star Trek has in common with the British navy, the deep sea inspiration for Avatar, how Ursula K Le Guin captured the 1960s sexual revolution in her acclaimed novel The Left Hand of Darkness, how Stanley Kubrick made 2001: A Space Odyssey seem so believable, and why a man in a dressing gown became one of science fiction's best-loved heroes in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.
Among the interviewees are William Shatner and Nichelle Nichols (Star Trek), Anthony Daniels and Kenny Baker (Star Wars), Zoe Saldana (Avatar) and author Neil Gaiman.
MON 00:30 Tomorrow's Worlds: The Unearthly History of Science Fiction (p026c7jt)
Invasion
Dominic Sandbrook continues his exploration of the most innovative and imaginative of all genres with a look at science fiction's fascination with aliens. But what if we don't meet aliens in space and instead they come to earth - to conquer us?
Dominic and leading writers and film-makers look at science fiction's obsession with alien invasion, from all-out assault to sinister hidden threats, and how it has reflected real-life anxieties - whether they be the challenge to Victorian imperial power of HG Wells's War of the Worlds, the Cold War-era paranoia of Invasion of the Body Snatchers or more recent concerns about racism and immigration in District 9.
And we celebrate the most famous alien invaders of all - the Daleks.
Among the contributors are David Tennant and Steven Moffat (Doctor Who), Richard Dreyfuss (Close Encounters of the Third Kind), director Roland Emmerich (Independence Day) and special effects maestros Phil Tippett (Jurassic Park) and Doug Trumbull (Close Encounters).
MON 01:30 Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village (b0bsrqfw)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 today]
MON 02:00 Inside Museums (m001645q)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:30 today]
MON 02:30 Ian Hislop's Fake News: A True History (m00095hv)
[Repeat of broadcast at
21:00 today]
TUESDAY 05 APRIL 2022
TUE 19:00 Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village (b0bsrqky)
Series 1
East Midlands
The story of Cromford. A picturesque Derbyshire village at the heart of famous industrialist Sir Richard Arkwright's mechanised cotton mills and a textile revolution. Presenter and archaeologist Ben Robinson discovers it wasn't just an industrial revolution. Cromford became a new kind of village, built to service the enterprise of this powerful man.
TUE 19:30 Inside Museums (m001646r)
Series 2
Manchester’s Whitworth
Manchester-born Diana Ali returns to the Whitworth, which had a profound impact on her life and inspired her career as an artist, to explore how art can speak a universal language, stir our emotions and challenge our beliefs.
The Whitworth art gallery is a thrilling clash of past and present, with a stunning collection from around the world. The city’s industrial history has shaped what’s within the gallery walls to provide an insight into our shared heritage. Today’s voices are shining a new light on society’s issues to shape our collective future.
TUE 20:00 Keeping Up Appearances (b007b692)
Series 3
Early Retirement
Count your blessings, they say. For some early retirement can be a blessing - for Hyacinth's Richard, this particular blessing comes very heavily disguised.
TUE 20:30 Yes, Prime Minister (b0074rz4)
Series 2
A Diplomatic Incident
Classic political sitcom. When Jim Hacker discovers the French are planning some dirty tricks to get political advantage, the PM turns the tables on them.
TUE 21:00 Gods of Snooker (m000w76x)
Series 1
Episode 2
Though snooker was firmly established on our TV screens by the early 80s, the game’s money-spinning potential had not yet been realised.
One of the first to spot a business opportunity was savvy Essex-based sports promoter Barry Hearn, who had recently taken a young hopeful called Steve Davis under his wing. Davis was the polar opposite of people’s champion Alex Higgins: slow, precise and intent on grinding out victories rather than entertaining with risky flair shots. Hearn was certain that his young apprentice was a future world champion, and together, the pair plotted world domination. As Higgins’s career took a downward turn, Davis quickly became a winning machine, bagging trophy after trophy. But his 'robotic' performances failed to win over a crowd who preferred their sporting heroes more flawed and unpredictable.
Capitalising on Davis’s success, Hearn started to build his own snooker empire - the 'Matchroom’- and recruited a small group of players he could mould and market, creating a soap opera out of sporting rivalry, and in the process, bringing lucrative sponsorships (and even hit pop singles) into the game.
By the mid-80s, snooker was at the peak of its powers, and in 1985 nearly 20 million people tuned in to see Steve Davis play Dennis Taylor in the World Championship final. It was an encounter that became known as the 'black ball final’, widely believed to be the best snooker match of all time. After that, Britain really did go 'snooker loopy', and a select group of cue-wielding sportsmen were suddenly the biggest superstars in the country.
TUE 22:00 Filth: The Mary Whitehouse Story (b00bws1h)
In 1963 an unknown housewife and teacher from the Midlands, Mary Whitehouse, embarked on a mission to clean up British television. Her crusade led her into battle with the man she held responsible for a tide of 'filth' - Sir Hugh Carleton-Greene, Director-General of the BBC.
With Julie Walters starring as Mary Whitehouse and Hugh Bonneville as her arch enemy, this is a drama inspired by real events that brings life to the battle for Britain's morals.
TUE 23:30 Meet the Romans with Mary Beard (b01ghsjx)
All Roads Lead to Rome
We still live in the shadow of ancient Rome - a city at the heart of a vast empire that stretched from Scotland to Afghanistan, dominating the West for over 700 years. Professor Mary Beard puts aside the stories of emperors and armies, guts and gore, to meet the real Romans living at the heart of it all.
In this programme, Mary asks not what the Romans did for us, but what the empire did for Rome.
She rides the Via Appia, climbs up to the top seats of the Colosseum, takes a boat to Rome's port Ostia and takes us into the bowels of Monte Testaccio. She also meets some extraordinary Romans: Eurysaces, an eccentric baker, who made a fortune out of the grain trade and built his tomb in the shape of a giant bread oven; Baricha, Zabda and Achiba, three prisoners of war who became Roman citizens; and Pupius Amicus, the purple dye seller making imperial dye from shellfish imported from Tunisia. This is Rome from the bottom up.
TUE 00:30 Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village (b0bsrqky)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 today]
TUE 01:00 Inside Museums (m001646r)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:30 today]
TUE 01:30 Gods of Snooker (m000w76x)
[Repeat of broadcast at
21:00 today]
TUE 02:30 Neanderthals - Meet Your Ancestors (b0b4dffq)
[Repeat of broadcast at
20:00 on Monday]
WEDNESDAY 06 APRIL 2022
WED 19:00 Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village (b0bsrqbz)
Series 1
South West
Archaeologist Ben Robinson explores the Cornish fishing village of Port Isaac. Behind the quaint facade lies something far more gritty - a place where people exploited a range of natural resources, on land and at sea, to make a living and find profits far beyond Britain's shores.
WED 19:30 Inside Museums (m0016487)
Series 2
Glasgow’s Treasure Palace
Artist Lachlan Goudie visits Glasgow’s Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum to explore a collection that he has loved since he was a boy.
Kelvingrove is Glasgow’s most important and popular cultural institution, a treasure palace that is home to a vast array of art and artefacts from across the world and across time. It has been a hugely influential part of Lachlan’s life, the single most important collection in shaping his ambition to become a painter.
Since the age of 12, Lachlan has taken his pencils and brushes to Kelvingrove to enter the Glasgow Museums Annual Art Competition. Among his prizewinning entries was a drawing of one of the stars of Kelvingrove’s collection, Sir Roger the Elephant, a taxidermy giant who has stood in the museum since its opening in 1902. Lachlan begins his tour of the museum with a visit to his old friend before moving on to other objects in the collection that fired his childhood imagination.
Rembrandt’s Man in Armour was the first painting Lachlan felt inexorably drawn towards as a boy, and one he has spent a lifetime trying to emulate. From his unique perspective as a practising artist, Lachlan’s exploration of the collection includes other masterpieces, including Salvador Dali’s controversial Christ of St John of the Cross, Van Gogh’s celebrated portrait of Alexander Reid and John Duncan Fergusson’s groundbreaking experiments in fauvist colour.
Lachlan examines the artistic processes underpinning these extraordinary paintings as well as exploring the astonishing and heartbreaking works by the lesser-known artist Marianne Grant, created at Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. Grant’s drawings force us to confront one of the most shocking moments in world history and sit alongside other objects in the museum that have renewed resonance in the context of today’s global events.
Revisiting an institution he has treasured all his life, in this film Lachlan will re-see objects with fresh eyes, revealing the power of Kelvingrove’s extraordinary collection to enlighten our history and to change the way we look at the world.
WED 20:00 Lucy Worsley's Royal Photo Album (m000j45l)
Lucy Worsley takes us through the story of the royal photograph – showing how the royal family collaborated with generations of photographers to create images that reinvented the British monarchy.
Lucy explores the key types of photo that have enabled the royal family to conduct a dialogue with the British people, forging a modern monarchy that reigns rather than rules. Along the way, she recreates the Queen’s coronation portrait, digs out some of the most photogenic outfits from the royal ceremonial dress collection, has her own Victorian-style picture taken, and learns the tricks of the trade from leading royal photographers Anwar Hussein and Chris Jackson.
Lucy begins with the story behind one of the most iconic images of the post-war era, Cecil Beaton’s coronation portrait of Elizabeth II, which conjured a vision of magic and tradition for austerity Britain. Yet within just a few years, the public were beguiled by some very different images - the daringly intimate portraits of Princess Margaret taken by her photographer husband Lord Snowdon.
Going back to the mid-19th century, Lucy looks at the earliest photographs of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, taken at a time when monarchies across Europe were under threat. Photography rescued them, showing the British royals as a family rather than aloof rulers. Cheap, collectable reproductions brought pictures of the queen and her consort into ordinary households for the very first time. Lucy also shows how advances in technology encouraged a more informal side to royal photography. In the early 1900s, Princess (later Queen) Alexandra started taking pictures of her family using new, lightweight cameras. The results revealed the royals as they’d never been seen before - on holiday, even almost relaxing. This insider’s approach has been continued by Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, who has published her own pictures on Instagram.
Lucy explains how the classic royal photo opportunity – the walkabout – dates back to the reign of George V and Queen Mary. In the run-up to, and during, World War I, the royal couple took to the streets, meeting ordinary workers and visiting hospitals in an attempt to connect with the public and be seen to serve the nation. But for all the pictures like these that the royal family want you to see, there are plenty they don’t. In the 1930s, every trick of the tabloid book was deployed, from long lenses to ambush filming, to capture Edward VIII’s scandalous relationship with Wallis Simpson. For the first time, photography was turned against the monarchy, fuelling the abdication crisis. Lucy sees how Edward’s brother George VI sought to limit the damage by publishing photos that presented him and his family in everyday scenes, stressing their respectability and stability, with the young princesses pushed to the fore.
No royal, however, has mastered photography as much as Princess Diana, who harnessed the multitude of cameras that seemed to follow her every move. Diana used her image to focus attention on her message, whether meeting Aids patients or stepping onto a recently cleared minefield - an image later echoed by her son, Harry. Lucy argues that Diana was the last great royal innovator – her story reflects the power of the camera but also its destructive potential. As a consequence, younger royals have sought to exert much tighter control over how their images are taken and used.
The programme was made in partnership with the Historic Royal Palaces’ exhibition, Picture this! Life through a royal lens, due to open at Kensington Palace in 2021.
WED 21:00 Putin, Russia and the West (b01bfwf1)
Democracy Threatens
Vladimir Putin, after eight years as president of Russia and four more as prime minister, is stubbornly holding on to power. He has announced his intention to return as president and declared his party the winner in parliamentary elections that are widely seen as fraudulent. In Moscow 100,000 protesters have taken to the streets in the largest demonstrations since Putin took office.
Putin began his career as a KGB spy but when he became president, he made himself a valued ally of the West. How did he do it? And what made Washington and London turn against him?
The second episode includes an extraordinary interview with former Ukrainian president Leonid Kuchma, who was widely thought to be responsible for murder, corruption and sanctions-busting. He tells how, in the 2004 election, he set about getting his chosen successor elected president - with the help of Putin and his Kremlin advisers.
The opposition candidate, Victor Yushchenko, tells what it was like to be poisoned during the election campaign. It won him many voters and exit polls gave him a clear lead, but the Putin/Kuchma-backed candidate was still declared the winner. This result sparked the Orange Revolution.
Kremlin officials tell how they made sure that Putin would not face a similar revolution at home. It is claimed critics of Putin, including the British ambassador, were intimidated and some were even murdered. Tens of thousands of young Russians were mobilised to fight the threat of democracy.
WED 22:00 Storyville (m0016489)
The Truffle Hunters
Deep in the forests of Piedmont, Italy, a handful of elderly men hunt for the rare and expensive white Alba truffle. This award-winning film follows these truffle hunters, who live and work alongside their cherished dogs in an eccentric world, guided by a secret culture and a training passed down through the generations.
WED 23:15 Woof! A Horizon Guide to Dogs (b01cqrvs)
Dallas Campbell looks back through the Horizon archives to find out what science can tell us about our best friend the dog, and whether new thinking should change the way we treat them. From investigating the domestic dog's wild wolf origins to discovering the remarkable impact that humans have had on canine evolution, Dallas explores why our bond with dogs is so strong and how we can best use that to manage them.
WED 00:15 Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village (b0bsrqbz)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 today]
WED 00:45 Inside Museums (m0016487)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:30 today]
WED 01:15 Lucy Worsley's Royal Photo Album (m000j45l)
[Repeat of broadcast at
20:00 today]
WED 02:15 Putin, Russia and the West (b01bfwf1)
[Repeat of broadcast at
21:00 today]
THURSDAY 07 APRIL 2022
THU 19:00 Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village (b0bsrqm9)
Series 1
East
Archaeologist Ben Robinson explores Lavenham in Suffolk, the best-preserved medieval village in the country. In the 16th century, Lavenham was one of the wealthiest places in England, becoming rich on its woollen cloth industry, but the industry declined and the wealthy abandoned Lavenham. By the 19th century it was a place of poverty, but today it is once more a jewel of a village.
THU 19:30 Inside Museums (m001648f)
Series 2
Ulster’s Folk Wonders
Marie-Louise Muir discovers the beauty of everyday objects, found at homes in Northern Ireland at the turn of the 20th century.
These include harnen stands, used to toast oatcakes in front of an open fire, and one of the finest examples of crazy patchwork quilts seen in any British museum. The enthusiasm of specialist curators and the people who demonstrate crafts at the museum, including metalwork, basket making and linen weaving, bring an extraordinary collection to life.
Marie-Louise discovers that this rich archive of buildings, photographs, languages, crafts and customs would not exist without the vision of EE Evans, a Welsh geographer, writer and acclaimed folklorist who spent his life in Northern Ireland. Professor Evans’s work became one of the cornerstones of the museum, which opened in 1964, and he inspired an army of volunteers to go out and record the lives of a fast-disappearing rural community.
The museum’s illustrated notebooks are one of the many behind-the-scenes treasures that Marie-Louise discovers on this very special tour.
This much-loved local museum aims to look not at the history of the battlefield but at the history of the ploughed field, asking visitors today to reflect on the shared heritage and history of Northern Ireland.
THU 20:00 Michael Wood's Story of England (b00vjmms)
Victoria to the Present Day
Groundbreaking series in which Michael Wood tells the story of one place throughout the whole of English history. The village is Kibworth in Leicestershire in the heart of England - a place that lived through the Black Death, the Civil War and the Industrial Revolution and was even bombed in World War Two.
In this final episode, helped by today's villagers Michael uncovers the secret history of a Victorian village more colourful than even Dickens could have imagined. Recreating their penny concerts of the 1880s, visiting World War I battlefields with the school and recalling the Home Guard, local land girls and the bombing of the village in 1940, the series finally moves into the brave new world of 'homes for heroes' and the villagers come together to leave a reminder of their world for future generations.
THU 21:00 Move Over, Darling (b00ky4xq)
Having gone missing in a plane crash five years ago and presumed long dead, a woman returns home to her husband and two children to find the husband has just remarried...
THU 22:40 Calamity Jane (m000qxbw)
Calamity Jane is the roughest, toughest gal in the town of Deadwood, and only 'Wild Bill' Hickok is man enough to discover the lady underneath the tough talk and gun belts.
Doris Day and Howard Keel star in this musical based on the lives of Calamity Jane and 'Wild Bill' Hickok, two real celebrities of the American West.
THU 00:20 Talking Pictures (b06mzk6m)
Hollywood Actresses
Sylvia Syms looks back on the legendary leading ladies of Hollywood - the glamorous and often powerful stars who helped define what it was to be a woman in cinema's golden age. Featuring Joan Crawford, Bette Davis, Lauren Bacall, Natalie Wood, Debbie Reynolds and Doris Day, the programme uses rarely seen archive and interviews to examine the relationships these great stars had with audiences, studio bosses - and sometimes with each other.
THU 01:05 Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village (b0bsrqm9)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 today]
THU 01:35 Inside Museums (m001648f)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:30 today]
THU 02:05 Michael Wood's Story of England (b00vjmms)
[Repeat of broadcast at
20:00 today]
FRIDAY 08 APRIL 2022
FRI 19:00 Dusty (m001648q)
Series 2
Episode 5
An edition of Dusty Springfield's 1960s variety show, first broadcast on 12 September 1967, with the voices of Madeline Bell, Leslie Duncan and Maggie Stredder. Her special guests are Latin singer-and-guitar trio Los Machucambos.
FRI 19:25 Dusty (b01r1zmr)
Series 2
Episode 6
A vintage episode of Dusty Springfield's 1960s TV series, featuring special guest, singer-songwriter Scott Walker. Among the highlights, Dusty sings You Don't Have to Say You Love Me.
FRI 19:50 Sounds of the Sixties (b051rz4l)
Reversions
1964-5: Getting in on the Act 3
The Seekers kick off this episode of the sixties archive pop programme. The Hollies and The Byrds, precursors to Crosby, Stills and Nash, also appear.
FRI 20:00 Top of the Pops (m001648s)
Tony Dortie presents the pop chart programme, first broadcast on 8 October 1992 and featuring Ned’s Atomic Dustbin, M People, Tasmin Archer, Prince and The New Power Generation, Dina Carroll, Billy Ray Cyrus, Take That and The Shamen.
FRI 20:30 Top of the Pops (m001648v)
Mark Franklin presents the pop chart programme, first broadcast on 15 October 1992 and featuring Sunscreem, Bizarre Inc featuring Angie Brown, Madonna, Doctor Spin, Boyz II Men, Bon Jovi and Tasmin Archer.
FRI 21:00 BBC Four Sessions (b03kk1j5)
Bonnie Raitt
Filmed at Stoke Newington Town Hall in north London, this career-spanning concert features Bonnie Raitt and her road-tested band in sparkling form.
Raitt started out supporting blues artists like Mississippi Fred McDowell, while championing the generation of singer-songwriters who emerged in the early 70s. She released her eponymously titled debut album in 1971 and her most recent album prior to this concert, Slipstream, came out in 2012.
This set roams across her career and includes signature songs like Love Has No Pride, Nick of Time and the bluesy Love Me Like a Man. The slide guitar-slinging, flame-haired queen of roots and blues rock is joined by frequent collaborator and songwriter Paul Brady on Marriage Made in Hollywood and there's even a bluesy romp through the old Elvis tune, A Big Hunk o' Love.
FRI 22:00 The Old Grey Whistle Test (m001648x)
Bonnie Raitt in Concert
Bob Harris introduces Bonnie Raitt in a special concert performance for the Old Grey Whistle Test from 1976.
FRI 22:40 6 Music Festival (m001648z)
2022
Cardiff Calling: 6 Music Festival 2022 Highlights
Cerys Matthews and Huw Stephens present highlights from this year's 6 Music Festival in Cardiff. As BBC Radio 6 Music celebrated its 20th birthday, the show captured some of the incredible performances that took place across the Welsh capital over the festival weekend, including Johnny Marr, Little Simz, Wet Leg, Pixies and IDLES. There are also exclusive backstage interviews with headline artists and a very special, intimate performance from Wales’s legendary Manic Street Preachers.
FRI 23:40 Stewart Copeland's Adventures in Music (m000db8k)
Series 1
Episode 1
Stewart Copeland explores the power music has to bring people together and to bond them in ways that are fundamental to our evolution and existence.
His travels take him from the southern German cave where a 40,000-year-old bone flute was discovered to the modern-day mass singalong of New York’s Choir! Choir! Choir! Along the way he gets to play with a Memphis marching band, join a song circle led by Bobby McFerrin, deconstruct the sexiness of 'Relax' with its producer Trevor Horn, discuss the art of songwriting with his old colleague Sting and learn how to create dance floor unity with international star DJ Honey Dijon.
FRI 00:40 Top of the Pops (m001648s)
[Repeat of broadcast at
20:00 today]
FRI 01:10 Top of the Pops (m001648v)
[Repeat of broadcast at
20:30 today]
FRI 01:40 BBC Four Sessions (b03kk1j5)
[Repeat of broadcast at
21:00 today]
FRI 02:40 Dusty (m001648q)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 today]
FRI 03:05 Dusty (b01r1zmr)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:25 today]
LIST OF THIS WEEK'S PROGRAMMES
(Note: the times link back to the details; the pids link to the BBC page, including iPlayer)
6 Music Festival
22:40 FRI (m001648z)
Arena
22:45 SUN (b0791p2k)
BBC Four Sessions
21:00 FRI (b03kk1j5)
BBC Four Sessions
01:40 FRI (b03kk1j5)
Calamity Jane
22:40 THU (m000qxbw)
Dusty
19:00 FRI (m001648q)
Dusty
19:25 FRI (b01r1zmr)
Dusty
02:40 FRI (m001648q)
Dusty
03:05 FRI (b01r1zmr)
Filth: The Mary Whitehouse Story
22:00 TUE (b00bws1h)
Gods of Snooker
21:00 TUE (m000w76x)
Gods of Snooker
01:30 TUE (m000w76x)
Hidden Wales with Will Millard
22:00 SAT (b0bsrhh2)
Hidden
21:00 SAT (p0btb8qc)
Ian Hislop's Fake News: A True History
21:00 MON (m00095hv)
Ian Hislop's Fake News: A True History
02:30 MON (m00095hv)
Inside Museums
19:30 MON (m001645q)
Inside Museums
02:00 MON (m001645q)
Inside Museums
19:30 TUE (m001646r)
Inside Museums
01:00 TUE (m001646r)
Inside Museums
19:30 WED (m0016487)
Inside Museums
00:45 WED (m0016487)
Inside Museums
19:30 THU (m001648f)
Inside Museums
01:35 THU (m001648f)
Keeping Up Appearances
00:15 SAT (b007b855)
Keeping Up Appearances
20:00 TUE (b007b692)
Lucy Worsley's Royal Photo Album
20:00 WED (m000j45l)
Lucy Worsley's Royal Photo Album
01:15 WED (m000j45l)
Meet the Romans with Mary Beard
23:30 TUE (b01ghsjx)
Michael Wood's Story of England
20:00 THU (b00vjmms)
Michael Wood's Story of England
02:05 THU (b00vjmms)
Move Over, Darling
21:00 THU (b00ky4xq)
Much Ado About Nothing
20:00 SUN (m001646w)
Neanderthals - Meet Your Ancestors
20:00 MON (b0b4dffq)
Neanderthals - Meet Your Ancestors
02:30 TUE (b0b4dffq)
Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village
19:00 MON (b0bsrqfw)
Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village
01:30 MON (b0bsrqfw)
Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village
19:00 TUE (b0bsrqky)
Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village
00:30 TUE (b0bsrqky)
Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village
19:00 WED (b0bsrqbz)
Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village
00:15 WED (b0bsrqbz)
Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village
19:00 THU (b0bsrqm9)
Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village
01:05 THU (b0bsrqm9)
Putin, Russia and the West
21:00 WED (b01bfwf1)
Putin, Russia and the West
02:15 WED (b01bfwf1)
Rick Stein's Long Weekends
20:00 SAT (b078djcl)
Rick Stein's Long Weekends
01:15 SAT (b078djcl)
Sounds of the Sixties
19:50 FRI (b051rz4l)
Stewart Copeland's Adventures in Music
23:40 FRI (m000db8k)
Storyville
22:00 WED (m0016489)
Talking Pictures
00:20 THU (b06mzk6m)
The Beauty of Maps
01:15 SUN (b00s3v0t)
The Beauty of Maps
01:45 SUN (b00s5p6k)
The Challenger
22:00 MON (p00zstkn)
The Normans
19:00 SAT (b00thpzb)
The Normans
02:15 SAT (b00thpzb)
The Old Grey Whistle Test
22:00 FRI (m001648x)
The Piano: A Passion
19:00 SUN (m001646t)
The Piano: A Passion
02:15 SUN (m001646t)
Tomorrow's Worlds: The Unearthly History of Science Fiction
23:30 MON (p01yqkdq)
Tomorrow's Worlds: The Unearthly History of Science Fiction
00:30 MON (p026c7jt)
Top of the Pops
20:00 FRI (m001648s)
Top of the Pops
20:30 FRI (m001648v)
Top of the Pops
00:40 FRI (m001648s)
Top of the Pops
01:10 FRI (m001648v)
Turtle, Eagle, Cheetah: A Slow Odyssey
00:45 SAT (m0001kwx)
Wogan: The Best Of
23:00 SAT (b05p6ky2)
Woof! A Horizon Guide to Dogs
23:15 WED (b01cqrvs)
Yes, Prime Minister
23:45 SAT (b0074rxz)
Yes, Prime Minister
20:30 TUE (b0074rz4)
imagine...
23:45 SUN (b0957h11)