Gravedigger Johnny Kingdom presents a look at the wildlife of the moors and woodlands of Exmoor. Winter has arrived early and with it a chance to film wildlife in the snow, but Johnny's plans are interrupted by a neighbour who brings him an injured buzzard to look after. He immediately gets to work but the buzzard, which he names Tommy, won't eat. Johnny is also keen to find out what happened to one of the Exmoor foals after the round up.
Sneak away into the sounds of quiet waters, velvety green shrubs and distant foothills. Bob Ross creates a scene of perfect relaxation.
American painter Bob Ross offers soothing words of encouragement to viewers and painting hobbyists in an enormously popular series that has captivated audiences worldwide since 1982. Ross is a cult figure, with nearly two million Facebook followers and 3,000 instructors globally. His soothing, nurturing personality is therapy for the weary, and his respect for nature and wildlife helps heighten environmental awareness.
Across the series, Ross demonstrates his unique painting technique, which eliminates the need for each layer of paint to dry. In real time, he creates tranquil scenes taken from nature, including his trademark ‘happy’ clouds, cascading waterfalls, snow-covered forests, serene lakes and distant mountain summits.
Many of Bob’s faithful viewers are not painters at all. They are relaxing and unwinding with Bob’s gentle manner and encouraging words, captivated by the magic taking place on the canvas.
'The Big Yin' embarks on a big adventure, as comedian Billy Connolly ventures from stage to ice - a frozen Arctic Ocean inhabited by ten-foot polar bears. The Scots mirth-maker is armed only with a small flimsy tent, a video camera and a BBC film crew. Not an ideal way to spend a week.
Wildlife cameraman Gordon Buchanan explores his native Mull and some of the nearby islands, filming otters, deer, puffins, seals and a minke whale.
Documentary series exploring the Yorkshire Ripper investigation. Following the murder of Josephine Whitaker in April 1979, Peter Sutcliffe’s crimes started to make headlines across the country and the investigation became consumed by a series of letters and a tape that claimed to come from the killer himself.
The letters and tape, addressed directly to George Oldfield, West Yorkshire’s chief constable, were sent by a man calling himself Jack the Ripper. Oldfield was so certain that they came from the killer that other suspects were ruled out on the basis of their handwriting or whether they had a north-east accent like the one on the tape. Director Liza Williams discovers that Oldfield’s character and his hunches have a lot to answer for when it comes to the direction of the investigation and what evidence was ruled in or out.
Survivors and relatives of those who were attacked recount how they were not listened to when their descriptions of the attacker did not match the voice on the tape. Liza also speaks to police officers who tell her about other promising lines of inquiry, tracing clues left behind at murder scenes. The ‘Wearside Jack’ tapes, however, took centre stage.
While the police disregarded evidence and focused on the tapes, terror grew and the killer started to become a kind of cult figure, with Yorkshire Ripper chants at football matches and Thin Lizzy’s Killer on the Loose topping the charts. As Liza discovers, this myth-making provoked anger from women and the police’s failure to catch the killer led to a demonstration on the streets of Leeds.
Ending with the arrest of Peter Sutcliffe, the episode reveals how his name was already in multiple police files. He had been interviewed nine times during the course of the investigation. He did not have a Wearside accent like the voice on the tape, but was born and bred in Yorkshire. Had the police arrested him the first time he was questioned in November 1977, seven women’s lives might have been saved.
Melchett orders Blackadder to unmask a spy working in the hospital where George is recovering from a bomb blast. Edmund sets to work, interrogating Darling, seducing a nurse and asking Baldrick to keep an eye on a patient with a pronounced German accent.
Sitcom set in the trenches of the First World War. When Blackadder, George and Baldrick are told they are going over the top the next day, Blackadder decides to feign madness.
A look back through the archives at Rowan Atkinson's appearances on some of the BBC's best-loved talk shows.
In early history, nudes were gods or heroes. Since then, the nude has often been about sex but also a powerful influence on how we view the body.
Art historian Kate Bryan explores six decades of BBC archive to discover how television has influenced our understanding of the nude and how our attitudes have changed.
As she examines the archives, Kate finds that while beauty and sexuality are never far away, artists have always used the nude as a vehicle to defy conventions.
Writer, broadcaster and Newsnight arts correspondent Stephen Smith explores Renaissance Florence under the reign of Grand Duke Cosimo Medici. Cosimo's fledgling court prized the finer things in life and some of the greatest painters, sculptors and craftsmen in world history came to serve the Grand Duke. But successful courtiers had to have brains as well as brawn. The canniest of them looked to theorists like Niccolo Machiavelli for underhand ways to get ahead, whilst enlightened polymaths turned their minds to the heavens, and to ice cream.
WEDNESDAY 26 AUGUST 2020
WED 19:00 Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor (b00793st)
Series 1
Birds and Beasts
Gravedigger Johnny Kingdom presents a look at the wildlife of the moors and woodlands of Exmoor. It's early January, normally a quiet time of year for filming wildlife. But suddenly some wild boars are let loose and Johnny and the media descend on Exmoor to try and find them. It's also the time of year to film spoonbills, one of the migrating birds that visit Exmoor in the winter, but to do that he must find a way of getting closer to them.
WED 19:30 The Joy of Painting (m000m2f4)
Series 3
Night Light
In this dark, breathtaking scene, Bob Ross creates an almost calm night with waves crashing against rocks and a protective lighthouse.
American painter Bob Ross offers soothing words of encouragement to viewers and painting hobbyists in an enormously popular series that has captivated audiences worldwide since 1982. Ross is a cult figure, with nearly two million Facebook followers and 3,000 instructors globally. His soothing, nurturing personality is therapy for the weary, and his respect for nature and wildlife helps heighten environmental awareness.
Across the series, Ross demonstrates his unique painting technique, which eliminates the need for each layer of paint to dry. In real time, he creates tranquil scenes taken from nature, including his trademark ‘happy’ clouds, cascading waterfalls, snow-covered forests, serene lakes and distant mountain summits.
Many of Bob’s faithful viewers are not painters at all. They are relaxing and unwinding with Bob’s gentle manner and encouraging words, captivated by the magic taking place on the canvas.
WED 20:00 Monty Don's Japanese Gardens (m0002pcx)
Series 1
Episode 2
Monty Don returns to Japan during the fiery blaze of autumn. He begins as he did in spring, at one of 'the three great gardens of Japan' to learn how they protect the garden from the coming winter.
He follows the history of the Japanese garden through the military strongholds of leaders past to the many styles, new and old, of the iconic stroll garden, and discovers a slice of Victorian England in the heart of Tokyo. He learns how the Japanese are weaving nature into their concrete urban jungle.
Monty explores rooftop gardens, takes lessons in the intricate art of bonsai and moss balls, as well as visiting an astounding modern feat of architecture and garden design. He ends his journey by the Sea of Japan at a place that literally makes art out of its gardens.
WED 21:00 Japan: Earth's Enchanted Islands (p02n9v9x)
The Southwest Islands
In the far south west of Japan, there is a chain of islands stretching towards the tropics - a place where all life is influenced by the power of the sea, and where volcanoes and typhoons are forces to be reckoned with.
The journey begins at an island at the top of the chain and travels south, revealing unexpected stories of isolation, unique wildlife and unsolved mysteries.
WED 22:00 The Art of Japanese Life (p054md5m)
Series 1
Cities
Dr James Fox explores how the artistic life of three great Japanese cities shaped the country's attitudes to past and present, east and west, and helped forge the very idea of Japan itself.
Beginning in Kyoto, the country's capital for almost a thousand years, James reveals how the flowering of classical culture produced many great treasures of Japanese art, including The Tale of Genji, considered to be the first novel ever written. In the city of Edo, where Tokyo now stands, a very different art form emerged, in the wood block prints of artists such as Hokusai and Hiroshige. James meets the artisans still creating these prints today, and discovers original works by a great master, Utamaro, who documented the so-called 'floating world' - the pleasure district of Edo.
In contemporary Tokyo, James discovers the darker side of Japan's urbanisation, through the photographs of street photographer Daido Moriyama, and meets one of the founders of the world-famous Studio Ghibli, Isao Takahata, whose haunting anime film Grave of the Fireflies helped establish anime as a powerful and serious art form.
WED 23:00 The Art of Japanese Life (p054mdmy)
Series 1
Home
In the final episode, Dr James Fox explores the art of the Japanese home. The clean minimalism of the Japanese home has been exported around the world, from modernist architecture to lifestyle stores like Muji. But the origins of this ubiquitous aesthetic evolved from a system of spiritual and philosophical values, dating back centuries. James visits one of Japan's last surviving traditional wooden villages, and the 17th-century villa of Rinshunkaku, and reveals how the unique spirit of Japanese craftsmen (shokunin) turned joinery into an artform - creating houses without the need for nails, screws or even glue.
Exploring some of the traditional arts of the Japanese home (where even food and flower arranging have been elevated to the level of art), James also investigates attitudes to domestic culture in modern Japan, meeting photographer Kyoichi Tsuzuki, chronicler of Japan's crowded cities and tiny apartments.
Other highlights include a performance by calligrapher and artist Tomoko Kawao and a visit to the hometown of Terunobu Fujimori, one of the most singular and playful contemporary architects working in Japan today.
WED 00:00 People's Palaces: The Golden Age of Civic Architecture (b00tnw4p)
Neo-Classical
Architectural historian Dr Jonathan Foyle explores some of the best Georgian and Victorian neo-classical civic buildings in the north of England. He visits town halls, concert halls, libraries, schools and galleries in Liverpool, Leeds, Bradford, Manchester and Todmorden in an unlikely story of rivalry, ambition and power in the service of social responsibility.
The north's public building boom was first funded by the profits of sugar, tobacco, cotton and slavery. Later, the Victorian municipalities in the increasingly powerful industrial and mercantile northern towns competed with one another to build bigger, better, more significant architectural monuments than the neighbouring city.
Neo-classicism harked back to Rome, democratic Athens and the Greek city-state. The regular proportion, geometry and symmetry of classical temple-style architecture suggested order in chaotically-expanding urban environments and served to associate towns regarded as squalid and unruly with the cultured ancient civilisations of antiquity. These were buildings constructed with the aim of elevating the towns in which they stood.
Featuring contributions from historians Lawrence Westgaph, Steve Binns, Joseph Sharples and Colin Cunningham, Jonathan Foyle visits Bluecoat School in Liverpool, John Woods's Liverpool Town Hall, Liverpool Athenaeum, Thomas Harrison's Liverpool Lyceum and Manchester Portico Library, Charles Barry's Royal Manchester Institution, Manchester Athenaeum, John Foster Jnr's Liverpool Oratory, Harvey Elmes's Liverpool St George's Hall, Lockwood and Mawson's Bradford St George's Hall, Cuthbert Brodrick's Leeds Town Hall, Liverpool's Walker Art Gallery, Cornelius Sherlock's Picton Reading Rooms and, to illustrate that smaller towns also aspired to neo-classical magnificence, Todmorden Town Hall.
WED 01:00 The Joy of Painting (m000m2f4)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:30 today]
WED 01:30 Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor (b00793st)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 today]
WED 02:00 The Beauty of Maps (b00s3v0t)
Medieval Maps - Mapping the Medieval Mind
Documentary series charting the visual appeal and historical meaning of maps.
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.
WED 02:30 Japan: Earth's Enchanted Islands (p02n9v9x)
[Repeat of broadcast at
21:00 today]
THURSDAY 27 AUGUST 2020
THU 19:00 Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor (b00793xh)
Series 1
New Life and Old Friends
Grave-digger Johnny Kingdom presents a look at the wildlife of the moors and woodlands of Exmoor. Spring has finally arrived on Exmoor and it's Johnny's busiest time of year for filming. But he's very worried about his three-legged pet deer Bambi who he rescued 12 years ago. She is not well and Johnny knows that the day is fast approaching when he'll have to make a very difficult decision about her future.
THU 19:30 The Joy of Painting (m000m2fv)
Series 3
The Old Mill
Journey into the country with Bob Ross and watch how he creates this painting of a large, old mill in the heart of a forest.
American painter Bob Ross offers soothing words of encouragement to viewers and painting hobbyists in an enormously popular series that has captivated audiences worldwide since 1982. Ross is a cult figure, with nearly two million Facebook followers and 3,000 instructors globally. His soothing, nurturing personality is therapy for the weary, and his respect for nature and wildlife helps heighten environmental awareness.
Across the series, Ross demonstrates his unique painting technique, which eliminates the need for each layer of paint to dry. In real time, he creates tranquil scenes taken from nature, including his trademark ‘happy’ clouds, cascading waterfalls, snow-covered forests, serene lakes and distant mountain summits.
Many of Bob’s faithful viewers are not painters at all. They are relaxing and unwinding with Bob’s gentle manner and encouraging words, captivated by the magic taking place on the canvas.
THU 20:00 Girl Friday (m000m2fx)
Joanna Lumley agrees to spend nine days on an uninhabited desert island off the coast of Madagascar with just a basic survival kit and a film crew.
THU 21:00 Brideshead Revisited (b014f32p)
Film adaptation of the novel by Evelyn Waugh. In the early spring of 1944 Charles Ryder, a disillusioned army Captain, arrives at Brideshead Castle, the new Brigade Headquarters. It is a place he knows well and he is transported back in time to 1922 and his first meeting with Sebastian Flyte, the younger son of Lord Marchmain. Charles Ryder proceeds to tell in flashback the story of his association with the castle and the doomed aristocratic Flyte family.
THU 23:05 Face to Face (p04qj22k)
Evelyn Waugh
John Freeman faced a difficult subject in Evelyn Waugh when he interviewed him in 1960. Waugh, author of Brideshead Revisited, was in characteristically obstructive frame of mind. The result is a rare glimpse into the life and temperament of one of the greatest novelists of this century.
THU 23:35 African Renaissance: When Art Meets Power (m000m2dn)
[Repeat of broadcast at
21:00 on Monday]
THU 00:35 Handmade in Africa (m000m2dj)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 on Monday]
THU 01:05 The Joy of Painting (m000m2fv)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:30 today]
THU 01:35 Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor (b00793xh)
[Repeat of broadcast at
19:00 today]
THU 02:05 The Beauty of Maps (b00s5p6k)
City Maps - Order out of Chaos
Documentary series charting the visual appeal and historical meaning of maps.
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'.
THU 02:35 Girl Friday (m000m2fx)
[Repeat of broadcast at
20:00 today]
FRIDAY 28 AUGUST 2020
FRI 19:00 Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor (b007941d)
Series 1
I'd Love to See a Badger
Gravedigger Johnny Kingdom presents a look at the wildlife of the moors and woodlands of Exmoor. Spring is well under way and the bluebells will be out soon at Johnny's new hide, which means he should be filming badger cubs any day now. But there's a problem - there's no sign of any cubs, and the food he's put down for the badgers is being eaten by squirrels, pheasants and rats. Johnny invites Tony Thorne to the hide to see if he'll bring him luck, but he's forgotten that Tony's afraid of rats.
FRI 19:30 Sounds of the Sixties (b0074qd8)
Original Series
In Living Colour
More from the BBC archive music programme. 1968 brought colour transmission to the BBC and artists such as The Kinks, The Moody Blues and The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band appear in all their polychrome glory.
FRI 20:00 Top of the Pops (b00zwrn5)
1964 to 1975 - Big Hits
1964 saw the birth of a very British institution. Spanning over four decades, Top of the Pops has produced many classic moments in pop culture.
Digging deep within the darkest depths of the BBC's archive, this compilation offers some memorable performances from 1964 through to 1975 from the likes of The Rolling Stones, Tom Jones, Status Quo, Procol Harum, Stevie Wonder, Queen and The Kinks, and opens the vintage vaults to rare performances from Stealers Wheel, Julie Driscoll, Peter Sarstedt and The Seekers.
So sit back and witness once again where music met television.
FRI 21:30 Peter Green: Man of the World (b00k92x1)
Legendary blues guitarist BB King named Peter Green as one of the greatest exponents of the blues, and the 'only guitar player to make me sweat'. If Green had only written Black Magic Woman, his name would still have a place in blues rock history forever.
His three short years leading Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac saw the band established as one of the biggest-selling groups of the 1960s. Yet at the height of their fame Green left the group, with his life spiralling into turmoil as drug-induced mental health issues took control. Rumours of his demise began to spread, and sightings of him became notorious.
After years battling his mental illness, Green is writing and recording again. Featuring archive performances and interviews with Carlos Santana, Noel Gallagher, founding members of Fleetwood Mac and Green himself, this film tells the story of one of blues rock's living legends.
FRI 23:00 Fleetwood Mac: Don't Stop (b00nq7q9)
Fleetwood Mac are one of the biggest-selling bands of all time and still on the road. Their story, told in their own words, is an epic tale of love and confrontation, of success and loss.
Few bands have undergone such radical musical and personal change. The band evolved from the 60s British blues boom to perfect a US West Coast sound that saw them sell 40 million copies of the album Rumours.
However, behind-the-scenes relationships were turbulent. The band went through multiple line-ups with six different lead guitarists. While working on Rumours, the two couples at the heart of the band separated, yet this heartache inspired the perfect pop record.
FRI 02:00 Peter Green: Man of the World (b00k92x1)
[Repeat of broadcast at
21:30 today]
LIST OF THIS WEEK'S PROGRAMMES
(Note: the times link back to the details; the pids link to the BBC page, including iPlayer)
Africa with Ade Adepitan
20:00 MON (m0002jl2)
Africa's Great Civilisations
22:00 MON (b0b6tp5l)
Africa's Great Civilisations
22:55 MON (b0b873nn)
African Renaissance: When Art Meets Power
21:00 MON (m000m2dn)
African Renaissance: When Art Meets Power
02:15 MON (m000m2dn)
African Renaissance: When Art Meets Power
23:35 THU (m000m2dn)
Art on the BBC
23:30 TUE (m000f4d2)
Avicii: True Stories
01:00 SAT (p075zdlk)
BBC Proms
19:25 SUN (b007xljj)
Billy Connolly: A Scot in the Arctic
20:00 TUE (p032kjf7)
Blackadder
22:00 TUE (p00bf6vt)
Blackadder
22:30 TUE (b0078nnr)
Brideshead Revisited
21:00 THU (b014f32p)
Coast
19:00 SUN (b08s2bg7)
EastEnders 2008
02:00 SUN (b00byf6t)
EastEnders 2008
02:30 SUN (b00bygpz)
EastEnders 2008
03:00 SUN (b00byj0s)
EastEnders 2008
03:30 SUN (b00byjhn)
Face to Face
23:05 THU (p04qj22k)
Fleetwood Mac: Don't Stop
23:00 FRI (b00nq7q9)
Girl Friday
20:00 THU (m000m2fx)
Girl Friday
02:35 THU (m000m2fx)
Handmade in Africa
19:00 MON (m000m2dj)
Handmade in Africa
00:35 THU (m000m2dj)
How to Get Ahead
00:30 TUE (b03yfwk1)
India: Nature's Wonderland
22:00 SUN (p02z83jc)
India: Nature's Wonderland
23:00 SUN (b06b3klq)
Inside Cinema
23:45 MON (m000f8xm)
Japan: Earth's Enchanted Islands
21:00 WED (p02n9v9x)
Japan: Earth's Enchanted Islands
02:30 WED (p02n9v9x)
Jigs and Wigs: The Extreme World of Irish Dancing
00:45 MON (b06w05v8)
Jigs and Wigs: The Extreme World of Irish Dancing
01:15 MON (b06wrkng)
Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor
19:00 TUE (b00793pl)
Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor
02:00 TUE (b00793pl)
Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor
19:00 WED (b00793st)
Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor
01:30 WED (b00793st)
Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor
19:00 THU (b00793xh)
Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor
01:35 THU (b00793xh)
Johnny Kingdom: A Year on Exmoor
19:00 FRI (b007941d)
Monty Don's Japanese Gardens
20:00 WED (m0002pcx)
On Camera: Photographers at the BBC
01:00 SUN (b08jgr3w)
People's Palaces: The Golden Age of Civic Architecture
00:00 WED (b00tnw4p)
Peter Green: Man of the World
21:30 FRI (b00k92x1)
Peter Green: Man of the World
02:00 FRI (b00k92x1)
Pole to Pole
20:00 SAT (p02gdbml)
Sounds of the Sixties
19:30 FRI (b0074qd8)
Storyville
00:00 SUN (b00936cb)
Talking Comedy
23:00 TUE (b084zxkv)
The Art of Japanese Life
22:00 WED (p054md5m)
The Art of Japanese Life
23:00 WED (p054mdmy)
The Beauty of Maps
02:00 WED (b00s3v0t)
The Beauty of Maps
02:05 THU (b00s5p6k)
The Bridge
21:00 SAT (b01hdbtb)
The Bridge
22:00 SAT (b01hdbtd)
The Bridge
23:00 SAT (b01hr5s3)
The Bridge
00:00 SAT (b01hr5s5)
The Joy of Painting
19:30 MON (m000m2dl)
The Joy of Painting
01:45 MON (m000m2dl)
The Joy of Painting
19:30 TUE (m000m2dg)
The Joy of Painting
01:30 TUE (m000m2dg)
The Joy of Painting
19:30 WED (m000m2f4)
The Joy of Painting
01:00 WED (m000m2f4)
The Joy of Painting
19:30 THU (m000m2fv)
The Joy of Painting
01:05 THU (m000m2fv)
The Yorkshire Ripper Files: A Very British Crime Story
02:35 SAT (m0003m05)
The Yorkshire Ripper Files: A Very British Crime Story
21:00 TUE (m0003m04)
The Yorkshire Ripper Files: A Very British Crime Story
02:30 TUE (m0003m04)
This Farming Life
19:00 SAT (b0756gt6)
Top of the Pops
20:00 FRI (b00zwrn5)
Wild
20:45 TUE (b00jd9yx)