SATURDAY 11 JUNE 2022

SAT 19:00 A History of Ancient Britain (b010n0gv)
Series 2

Age of Invasion

Continuing his epic story, Neil Oliver explores the remains of brutal Iron Age battles and Celtic rebellion as he reaches the moment when Celtic Britain was ripped apart by the world's great empire - Rome.


SAT 20:00 Michael Palin: Travels of a Lifetime (m000n7c8)
Series 1

Episode 1

How ex-Monty Python comic Michael Palin became an accidental traveller when he accepted an offer to go around the world in 80 days, following the route of Phileas Fogg in the classic Jules Verne story. He looks back on the programmes and his diaries to reveal how the series was made and the impact it had. And fans and friends including Sir David Attenborough, Joanna Lumley and Simon Reeve reflect on his achievements. Little did he know the resulting series would become a huge hit, changing the face of TV travel programmes.

Journeying from London to Venice, Michael first encounters the grubby side of that famous city as he does a shift with its refuse collectors. Then it is on to Egypt, where he is thrown into the maelstrom of Cairo life and starts to get a taste for the unexpected. Gradually, Michael, who began the series nervous about the scale of this undertaking, sheds his inhibitions and embrace the joy of travelling.

After a detour overland across Saudi Arabia, Michael experiences a magical voyage on an open-topped boat called a dhow across the Arabian Sea to India. On board, he discovers a natural talent for engaging with people from completely different backgrounds – a style of presenting that became his signature. India presents huge challenges, but a train journey from Bombay to Madras also offers a chance to meet more local people and capture the character of this huge country. From here, it is on to Hong Kong and into Communist China, which, at the time, was a closed and mysterious land to most Westerners.

Michael’s journey through China reveals a country and a people most of his viewers had never seen in this way. Finally, after crossing the Pacific, the USA and the Atlantic, Michael arrives home to find England greyer - and less friendly - than he would have hoped. But he has completed the challenge in 80 days, and with it, he has discovered his passion for travel.


SAT 21:00 Tove (m0018b1j)
Biopic of Tove Jansson, the renowned Finnish artist, author and creator of the Moomins.

Born in the 1910s to an artist family, young Tove is always creative, but from early on she has to contend with the shadow of her father, established Finnish sculptor Viktor Jansson.

The film charts Tove's formative years - her love affairs with philosopher Atos Wirtanen and theatre director Vivica Bandler, her early career as a painter, and how she came up with the Moomin characters that eventually made her famous.

In Finnish and Swedish with English subtitles.


SAT 22:40 Francesco's Mediterranean Voyage (b00cl5zl)
Bosnia and Dubrovnik

Conditions at sea are turning rough as Francesco da Mosto continues his journey, sailing from Venice to Istanbul. The coastline is stunning, but he cannot fail to notice the scars of war that followed hard on the collapse of Yugoslavia.

His first stop is the great Mostar bridge - an ancient symbol of unity destroyed in a moment of madness in war and now rebuilt. Once again, the young men of the town take their lives in their hands and leap from the bridge to prove their manhood. Francesco then travels to the nearby town of Medugorje, where locals claim to have seen the Virgin Mary, promising a new era of peace and prosperity.

Then begins some island-hopping and reminders of Venice - the beautiful island of Hvar is like a home from home, and the crew enjoy their first night out on the town. Heading for Korcular, Francesco berates the locals for trying to claim it was birthplace to Marco Polo.

Then on to the medieval city of Dubrovnik, a great trading city-state and still one of the most beautiful cities in the world. What better place for Francesco to discover the secret of eternal youth than in the great Franciscan monastery at the heart of the old town!


SAT 23:10 Francesco's Mediterranean Voyage (b00cl6nw)
Montenegro and Albania

On the next step of his sea voyage from Venice to Istanbul, Francesco da Mosto is sailing into the Bay of Kotor where Venetian sailors knew they were leaving safe waters for the dangers of pirates and the ships of rival powers.

So perhaps it's wise for Francesco and the crew to stop off at the magical little church of Santuario della madonna della scarpello, perched on a few rocks in the open sea. Here Venetian sailors prayed for a safe voyage or, if they were lucky, where they offered thanks to God for a safe return.

Many Venetian ships came to grief here - if not through attack then they fell victim to the elements. Off the coast of Montenegro, Francesco dives to a shipwreck deep on the ocean bed.

Next is Ulcinj - a pirate fortress town - where captives taken by pirates were held before being sold into slavery. Even today it has an air of menace. Francesco sees the original cells where Venetians unlucky enough to fall into the hands of the pirates were imprisoned.

The next stop is Durres on the coast of Albania - poor and facing an uncertain future after the all-too-recent rule of Communist dictator, Enver Hoxha. The capital city of Tirana is still the stuff of spies and Cold War intrigue but the colourful city mayor is pinning his hopes on a dramatic makeover of the city.


SAT 23:40 Wogan: The Best Of (b05pzsjg)
Real People

Sir Terry Wogan remembers some memorable moments from the Wogan show. This episode features rare interviews with HRH Princess Anne, the then prime minister Margaret Thatcher, model Naomi Campbell and footballer Paul Gascoigne. Plus music from Peggy Lee, and an early performance by violinist Vanessa Mae.


SAT 00:25 Keeping Up Appearances (b0077zlm)
Series 3

What to Wear When Yachting

Sitcom about an obsessive snob. When Hyacinth plans a nautical supper, events take an unexpected turn - and so does the boat!


SAT 00:55 Ever Decreasing Circles (b007bn31)
Series 1

The New Neighbour

Martin is a pillar of the community, an avid chairman of every club committee going, who sees himself very much as lord of his manor. But the equilibrium of his world is disrupted when a suave new next-door neighbour moves in.


SAT 01:25 Michael Palin: Travels of a Lifetime (m000n7c8)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:00 today]


SAT 02:25 A History of Ancient Britain (b010n0gv)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 today]



SUNDAY 12 JUNE 2022

SUN 19:00 Our Classical Century (m0002dx7)
Series 1

1936-1953

Suzy Klein and John Simpson explore the power of classical music between the coronations of George VI and Elizabeth II, through WWII and into peacetime, to console, unite and inspire the nation.

Our Classical Century brings together the greatest moments in classical music in Britain over the last 100 years in a four-part series celebrating extraordinary pieces of music and performance, revealing how music has provided a unifying soundtrack when national identity and destiny are at stake.

In this episode, presenter Suzy Klein is joined by music lover and BBC world affairs editor John Simpson to explore how classical music underscored the coronations of George VI and Elizabeth II, how it provided succour and inspiration during WWII and how it responded to social change as we emerged into peace. They explain how William Walton, creator of the radical, witty piece Facade with Edith Sitwell in the 1920s, composed Crown Imperial for George VI’s coronation, full of Elgarian pomp and circumstance.

With the outbreak of war, Suzy investigates the remarkable legacy of pianist Myra Hess, her signature tune, Bach’s Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring, and how Kenneth Clark encouraged her to create a series of morale-boosting lunchtime concerts at the National Gallery in the heart of war-torn London. An audience member remembers the moving and inspiring impact of Myra’s music on those enduring the Blitz.

From the tragic destruction of Queen’s Hall, traditional home to the Proms, the episode charts the triumph of the first Prom in its new home, the Royal Albert Hall. John talks about the remarkable reception that greeted one of the pieces played at the prom, the first performance of Shostakovich’s 7th Symphony, the Leningrad. Written under siege, the piece only arrived in Britain after the score was elaborately smuggled on film out of Russia via Iran to London. Paul Patrick, the BBC Philharmonic’s principal percussionist, tells how he prepares for the demanding task of recreating the sound of war in the symphony.

The war over, our presenters chart the emergence of our love of classical music in peacetime, with the unexpected success of young composer Benjamin Britten’s complex opera Peter Grimes and its hugely popular performance at Sadler's Wells. Tenor Stuart Skelton performs excerpts and reflects on why it struck such a chord.

A new Labour government believed music should be part of everyone’s experience and the 1944 Butler Education Act helped put music on the school curriculum for the very first time. Our presenters explore the creation of Britten’s classic The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra in 1945, and Malcolm Sargent’s film of it, unforgettably introducing classical music to generations of children. Through the Festival of Britain, which brought music to the heart of the nation, this episode arrives at the 1953 Coronation. By then two and a half million homes had TVs and, with an audience of 20 million, the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II became a showcase of our best classical music for its biggest audience ever: Elgar, Holst, Vaughn Williams, Purcell, Handel’s Zadok the Priest, and the whole event crowned by William Walton’s Orb and Sceptre, a fresh youthful-sounding coronation march for a young queen.

Between the coronations of Elizabeth II and her father, the nation had undergone immense trauma, social and political change. This programme charts the role classical music played in sustaining our cultural life and responding to the challenges of a new era.


SUN 20:00 The Lark Ascending (b019c9t9)
Dame Diana Rigg explores the enduring popularity of The Lark Ascending by the English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams, which was recently voted Britain's favourite piece of classical music by listeners to Desert Island Discs on BBC Radio 4.

Composed at a key turning point in world history, The Lark Ascending represents music for all occasions. It is used in rites of passage such as births, deaths and marriages, and is a favourite for film-makers looking to create that quintessential English pastoral feel. Fans of the work include actor Peter Sallis, who wants a copy of The Lark Ascending to be buried with him, top violinist Tasmin Little, who has played the piece as part of the BBC Proms, and music critic Michael Kennedy, who was a personal friend of Vaughan Williams.

The programme includes a beautiful new performance of the work in the same village hall where it was heard for the first time in December 1920. The Lark Ascending is performed by 15-year-old violin prodigy Julia Hwang and pianist Charles Matthews, using the original arrangement for violin and piano.


SUN 20:30 Performance Live (b09wwkrq)
Winged Bull in the Elephant Case

During World War Two the National Gallery’s art collection was taken for safe-keeping to Snowdonia. Winged Bull in the Elephant Case dramatises the journey of a lost painting that takes human form, as it strives, with help from its friends, to get back to the National Gallery.

Combining extraordinary dance forms, filmed underground and in London's National Gallery, this immersive performance for the screen questions how far we should go to preserve our cultural heritage in the face of violence and aggression.

Introduced by Clemency Burton-Hill, Winged Bull in the Elephant Case features choreography by Wayne McGregor, with additional choreography by Charlotte Edmonds, Botis Seva and Bonetics, performed by Company Wayne McGregor, Alessandra Ferri, Bonetics, and Far From The Norm. The music is composed by Joel Cadbury with performances by pianist Joanna MacGregor and cellist Tunde Jegede, and spoken word performed by Isaiah Hull.


SUN 21:00 Isla (m0018b47)
Soon there will be more voice-activated digital assistants than people. All are female-gendered. Roger needs company, and he doesn’t want a dog. When his daughter Erin buys him the latest Isla digital assistant, an unexpected relationship between man and technology emerges. But who's really in control?

This thought-provoking, and at times troubling, dark comedy written by playwright Tim Price, has been adapted for television following its world premiere at Theatr Clwyd in North Wales. It was helmed by the theatre’s artistic director Tamara Harvey and stars Mark Lambert as retired teacher Roger, who is struggling with lockdown following the death of his wife.

Lisa Zahra plays his concerned-but-busy daughter, who thinks a smart speaker is the perfect home help for her lonely dad, but never imagined it would lead to a visit from the police as well as surprising and sometimes upsetting revelations from his past.

Expect laughs, technology-induced frustration and some strong language.


SUN 22:00 Margot (b00p510x)
Drama based on events in the life of ballerina Dame Margot Fonteyn. At the beginning of the 1960s, Fonteyn faces retirement from her career as a prima ballerina and a crisis in her marriage to Panamanian 'politician' Tito de Arias. When the much younger Rudolf Nureyev arrives on the scene, he transforms Margot's professional and personal life in a partnership celebrated around the world. But when Tito is shot and paralysed, the dancer faces an agonising choice about her future.


SUN 23:30 Queen Victoria's Children (b01pp965)
The Best Laid Plans...

Queen Victoria and Prince Albert shared a passionate marriage. Behind closed doors, royal domestic life often seemed like a battlefield.

In a 60-year family saga this new three-part series explores the reign of Victoria through her personal relationships with her husband and her nine children. It is a story of manipulation, conflict, intimidation, emotional blackmail, and fevered attempts by her children to escape the clutches of their domineering and needy mother.

The series uses a wealth of written material and photos left by Victoria, Albert and their children, including letters, diaries, memoirs and journals, to bring the subject and characters to life.

This first episode focuses on Victoria's tempestuous relationship with Prince Albert, their attempts to engineer the upbringing of their children and to save the monarchy by projecting a modern image of the royal family.


SUN 00:30 Queen Victoria's Children (b01pp9dg)
A Domestic Tyrant

Queen Victoria and Prince Albert shared a passionate marriage. Behind closed doors, royal domestic life often seemed like a battlefield.

In a 60-year family saga this new three-part series explores the reign of Victoria through her personal relationships with her husband and her nine children. It is a story of manipulation, conflict, intimidation, emotional blackmail, and fevered attempts by her children to escape the clutches of their domineering and needy mother.

The series uses a wealth of written material and photos left by Victoria, Albert and their children, including letters, diaries, memoirs and journals, to bring the subject and characters to life.

This episode concentrates on Victoria's relationship with her daughters. It looks at how, after Albert's death, Victoria clung to and bullied them and arranged their marriages. In response the princesses fought back, becoming independent women determined to find love and fresh purpose. From sculpture to medicine, the daughters became champions of women for a new era.


SUN 01:30 Our Classical Century (m0002dx7)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 today]


SUN 02:30 Prejudice and Pride: The People's History of LGBTQ Britain (p0578x02)
Series 1

Episode 1

Every so often the world changes beyond your wildest dreams. In 1967, the Sexual Offences Act partially decriminalised homosexuality, offering lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people the opportunity to start living openly for the first time.

Presented by Stephen K Amos and Susan Calman, this unique series features LGBTQ people from across the UK as they share the objects that have helped define their lives during 50 transformative years.

In episode one, these crowdsourced treasures range from a rare collection of the first openly gay magazine (featuring a virtually unknown young singer called David Bowie) to letters from worried parents trying to understand their newly 'out' daughters and sons.

Over 20 incredible years, 1967-1987, we meet the fearless revolutionaries of the Gay Liberation Front, a transgender pioneer who almost caused a strike and a woman who faced losing her children when she came out as a lesbian. By the early 1980s, LGBTQ people were starting to build a community, which would be tested to the limit when Aids loomed.

This is the story of ordinary people in extraordinary times - told through their cherished possessions - charting the joys and heartbreaks of just being true to yourself.

Prejudice and Pride: The People's History of LGBTQ Britain is part of Gay Britannia, a season of programming produced in 2017 to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1967 Sexual Offences Act.



MONDAY 13 JUNE 2022

MON 19:00 A Wild Year (m000kxy7)
Series 1

The North York Moors

In the north east of England lies a wild and remote moorland - 550 square miles of windswept heather-clad uplands and deep, sheltered valleys or dales. These are the North York Moors.

Over millennia, this spectacular landscape has been shaped by the elements - by water and ice - and more recently by people.

Remote farmsteads are dotted all across the high country. On Dale Head Farm, the Barraclough family raise tough swaledale and cheviot sheep, animals bred for the moorland life. They can be left out on the hill year-round because over many generations they have built up an intimate knowledge of their patch - each flock is ‘hefted’ to the land.

The flocks are brought down off the moors to the shelter of the dales a couple of times each year - in the spring for lambing and again in the summer to be shorn of their heavy winter coats. The best shearers can clip 300 sheep in a day.


MON 20:00 Earth’s Tropical Islands (m000cs1p)
Series 1

Hawaii

This is a journey across Hawaii’s varied islands, discovering how they were made and the incredible wildlife that thrives there.

Hawaii is the most remote island chain on earth, and its tropical shores are hard to reach. But for the hardy creatures that can make it here, like the waterfall-climbing fish, carnivorous caterpillar and Laysan albatross, a land of opportunity awaits. From newly formed lava fields to lush jungles and vibrant coral reefs, these diverse and beautiful islands have it all.

Packed with surprising stories, the hidden gems of this tropical paradise are uncovered using stunning photography. Dramatic footage of the humpback whale heat run – the biggest courtship battle in the world – and intimate views of the world’s oldest known bird feeding its chick are just some of the highlights of what Hawaii has to offer.

The islands are so isolated that it used to be that one new species arrived every 100,000 years, but the arrival of people has radically changed the face of Hawaii. Now it gains around 20 new species every year. The remarkable Jackson’s chameleon is one of the animals recently introduced. Showing off its voracious appetite, the programme reveals how it is eating its way through the native animals and contributing to wiping them out entirely.

But this is a place where people are looking to the future and attempting to bring wildlife back from the brink of extinction. White terns, once extinct on the main islands of Hawaii, have gone from a single pair to over 2,000 birds in the last 60 years. It is a huge challenge, but people are seeking progressive new ways to live alongside nature to allow Hawaii’s wildlife to continue to thrive.


MON 21:00 Horizon (m000kqm9)
2020

Pluto: Back from the Dead

The incredible story of how Pluto has been propelled from an unremarkable ball of ice on the edge of the solar system to a world of unimaginable complexity - where some form of alien life might exist.

Featuring first-hand accounts of the incredible discoveries made by New Horizons from many of the scientists involved in the mission.


MON 22:00 The Sky at Night (m0018b4q)
The Astronomer Royal at 80

Martin Rees is perhaps Britain’s most renowned cosmologist. He was master of Trinity College, Cambridge, president of both the Royal Astronomical Society and the Institute of Physics, and has led the nation’s foremost science institution, the Royal Society. Now, about to celebrate his eightieth birthday, Lord Rees talks to Chris Lintott about his career in science.

Lord Rees says he wasn’t particularly interested in the night sky as a child and only pursued science at school because he found languages difficult. He also regretted reading maths at Cambridge, only finding his stride during his postgraduate studies, when he was taken on by Dennis Sciama to undertake research in astrophysics, leading to his PhD.

Rees’s career spans what he calls a ‘golden age’ for astronomy. It began during a time when the origin of the universe was debated, when the flamboyant Fred Hoyle’s ‘steady state’ theory was eventually put to the sword by the bookish Martin Ryle, using the new technology of radio astronomy – in part aided and abetted by a young Martin Rees, whose work on quasars helped deal the fatal blow.

Rees was a contemporary of Stephen Hawking and witnessed at first hand the excitement of seeing black holes elevated from a speculative concept to an integral part of our universe’s evolution. Like many advances, including radio astronomy, it happened thanks to accidents in simultaneous progress. Work on radar during WWII led to advances in seeing the universe in non-visible wavelengths. Though they had been postulated in the 19th century, the reality of black holes arrived via Einstein’s theory of relativity, combined with radio astronomy and Roger Penrose’s genius for maths.

Time and again, over Rees’s career, seemingly bizarre ideas in cosmology have turned out to have merit. Rees and his colleagues showed that ‘dark matter’ – a speculative ‘fix’ for inconsistencies in galaxy dynamics – is also essential to the understanding of how the early universe found form, giving the concept increased credibility.

One of science’s most celebrated thinkers and writers, Rees has never been shy of engaging with difficult concepts. While the ‘big bang’ solved the question of our origin story, it also raises other questions such as ‘what was there before the big bang?’, and Rees enjoys considering the possibility that there are other universes, perhaps with the properties of our universe that gave rise to us, or perhaps wholly or partially different.

Lord Rees also discusses the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, noting that while complex life may arise or has arisen in the universe, the likelihood is that, given the massive timescales involved, we are almost guaranteed to co-exist. But this leads to the intriguing prospect that any intelligent civilisation, including our own, is likely to create artificial intelligences that will supersede us and may well be near-immortal.

While Lord Rees worries about the threats that AI and the misuse of technology poses to our civilisation, he sees a potentially bright future in terms of scientific discovery, citing international collaborations and technological advances that might see us answering some of the questions we consider today to be too difficult - like the start of the universe and black holes used to be not so long ago.


MON 23:00 Horizon (b05n8jqs)
2014-2015

Dancing in the Dark - The End of Physics?

Scientists genuinely don't know what most of our universe is made of. The atoms we're made from only make up four per cent. The rest is dark matter and dark energy (for 'dark', read 'don't know'). The Large Hadron Collider at CERN has been upgraded. When it's switched on in March 2015, its collisions will have twice the energy they did before. The hope is that scientists will discover the identity of dark matter in the debris.

The stakes are high - because if dark matter fails to show itself, it might mean that physics itself needs a rethink.


MON 00:00 Queen Victoria's Children (b01pp9l9)
Princes Will Be Princes...

Queen Victoria and Prince Albert shared a passionate marriage. Behind closed doors, royal domestic life often seemed like a battlefield.

In a 60-year family saga, this three-part series explores the reign of Victoria through her personal relationships with her husband and her nine children. It is a story of manipulation, conflict, intimidation, emotional blackmail, and fevered attempts by her children to escape the clutches of their domineering and needy mother.

The series uses a wealth of written material and photos left by Victoria, Albert and their children, including letters, diaries, memoirs and journals, to bring the subject and characters to life.

This final episode focuses on Victoria's relationship with her sons and how, after Albert's death, they struggled to live up to his model of purity. It explores Victoria's difficult relationship with her eldest son Bertie, whom she blamed for Albert's death, believing his sexual indiscretions to have fatally weakened her husband. It also examines her relationship with her son Leopold, the physically weak but spirited haemophiliac who put up the most determined effort to break free from his mother's control. Ultimately, the idea of monarchy based on purity is put to the test as the philandering Bertie comes to the throne.


MON 01:00 Secrets of Skin (m000cdzr)
Series 1

Moving

What makes sharks built for speed? How do snakes move without limbs? How do sugar gliders fly without feathers? The answer all lies in their skin.

Professor Ben Garrod uncovers the secrets of how skin has evolved to enable animals to solve some of the most remarkable challenges on Earth. To do this, Ben heads to the specialist flight centre at the Royal Veterinary College to analyse the way a sugar glider uses its skin flaps to stay aloft. He goes diving with sharks at the Blue Planet Aquarium and discovers that, far from being smooth, sharkskin is incredibly rough. It is covered with thousands of tiny teeth that make a shark hydrodynamic.

Ben also finds out how the keratinised scales on snakes' bellies are the perfect configuration to allow them to move over virtually any surface they encounter.


MON 01:30 A Wild Year (m000kxy7)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 today]


MON 02:30 Earth’s Tropical Islands (m000cs1p)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:00 today]



TUESDAY 14 JUNE 2022

TUE 19:00 Great American Railroad Journeys (b09pw36m)
Series 3

Boston

Armed with his 19th-century Appleton's guidebook to the United States and Canada, Michael Portillo embarks on a 1,100-mile railroad journey from Boston, Massachusetts, across the border to Toronto in the Canadian province of Ontario. Along the way, he encounters revolutionaries and feminists, pilgrims and witches and rides some of the oldest and most breathtaking railroads in the world.

At risk of being uncovered as a Tory spy, Michael joins the Sons of Liberty aboard ship in Boston harbour. Will he help rebels jettison 112 crates of East India Company tea? Michael rides America's first subway and sups oysters in Boston's oldest restaurant. Heading out of the city along the route of one of the earliest railroads in the United States, Michael reaches Lowell, renowned as the birthplace of the American Industrial Revolution. A historic streetcar conveys him to the Boott Cotton Mills, where he discovers a flagrant act of industrial espionage and militancy among the thousands of women and girls who worked there.

Michael's guide sets him on the trail of the second largest organ in the world, located now in Haverhill. He is rewarded with a rousing rendition of the Battle Hymn of the Republic, courtesy of the 19th-century Handel and Haydn Choir.


TUE 19:30 Iolo's Snowdonia (b09qqnxv)
Series 1

Episode 1

Iolo starts his journey during spring in Nant Ffrancon in the Ogwen Valley where he finds one of Britain's most-threatened birds - the twite. Mountain guide Hannah Hughes takes him high up above the stunning glacial landscape of Cwm Idwal for a spectacular view of the high peaks. On the slopes of Snowdon, bluebells bloom, while shepherd Hefin Hughes keeps sheep off arctic plants. On the foothills of the Rhinog Mountains, cuckoos call.

Iolo heads to a wonderful hidden river gorge in full flow and listens to the best dawn chorus in Snowdonia in an ancient woodland. He joins Josie Bridges, who is part of a team tracking pine martens that were released in mid-Wales during 2015 after apparently disappearing from the whole of Wales over 50 years ago. A family of pine martens has made its way to Snowdonia, a journey of around 50 miles from the release site. Iolo also discovers a relic of a past landscape. Bird Rock, an imposing crag in the Dysynni Valley, may have once overlooked the sea, and to this day cormorants still nest on the rock - it being Wales's only inland nesting colony.


TUE 20:00 Keeping Up Appearances (b007b78b)
Series 4

A Job for Richard

Richard is far from happy when Hyacinth concocts an elaborate plan to turn him into a Frosticle executive with the help of a chukka of golf!


TUE 20:30 Ever Decreasing Circles (b007bn3d)
Series 1

Taking Over

Paul takes over the residents' association meeting and Martin is relieved of his chairmanship. A renewed social life beckons, but their new found freedom is short lived as Martin finds himself being used.


TUE 21:00 Prejudice and Pride: The People's History of LGBTQ Britain (b08zn99q)
Series 1

Episode 2

Every so often the world changes beyond your wildest dreams. In 1967 the Sexual Offences Act partially decriminalised homosexuality, offering lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people the opportunity to start living openly for the first time.

Presented by Stephen K Amos and Susan Calman, this unique series features LGBTQ people from across the UK as they share the objects that helped define their lives during 50 transformative years.

In episode two, these crowdsourced artefacts include a copy of the controversial schoolbook Jenny Lives with Eric and Martin, naval discharge papers and even a pair of Ugg boots.

We meet the nun-impersonating freedom fighters the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, the writer behind TV's steamiest lesbian kiss and a Muslim man who set up an LGBT support group for Southeast Asians.

Ranging from 1987 to 2017, this was an era when public acceptance of homosexuality overtook the government's - a time when many celebrities came out and stood up for LGBTQ rights. But it is also the story of ordinary people in extraordinary times - told through their treasured possessions - charting the joys and heartbreaks of just being true to yourself.

Prejudice and Pride: The People's History of LGBTQ Britain is part of Gay Britannia, a season of programming produced in 2017 to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1967 Sexual Offences Act.


TUE 22:00 Time and Again (m000g2w0)
Welsh acting legend Dame Siân Phillips stars alongside Brigit Forsyth in this award-winning drama written and directed by Cardiff-based film-maker Rachel Dax. Having been screened internationally at film festivals, this is the television premiere.

Time and Again is a heart-wrenching and uplifting tale of two young women separated by society.


TUE 22:30 Queer as Art (p057958x)
Hour-long documentary celebrating the LGBTQ contribution to the arts in Britain in the 50 years since decriminalisation. This film is part of the Gay Britannia season of BBC programming to mark the 50th anniversary celebrations.

The film features interviews with leading figures from right across the arts in Britain, including Stephen Fry, David Hockney, Sir Antony Sher, Alan Cumming, Sandi Toksvig, Jeanette Winterson, Will Young and Alan Hollinghurst, and it explores the distinctive perspectives and voices that LGBT artists have brought to British cultural life.


TUE 23:30 Queers (b08zzbhb)
Series 1

I Miss the War

The 1967 Sexual Offences Act will revolutionise everything, won't it? Well, perhaps not as far as dapper gent Jackie is concerned.


TUE 23:50 Queers (b08zzbhd)
Series 1

Safest Spot in Town

As the Blitz hits London, Fredrick is grateful that he survived in a very unlikely place of refuge.


TUE 00:10 Queers (b08zzcm3)
Series 1

The Perfect Gentleman

Bobby is a swaggering man about town. But Bobby has a secret. Can it survive when it really matters?


TUE 00:30 Queers (b08zzcm5)
Series 1

Something Borrowed

Steve, a groom-to-be, anxiously prepares his wedding speech. But now the big day is here, what has been won and what has been lost?


TUE 00:50 Secrets of Skin (m000cdz8)
Series 1

Protection

How does a giraffe stay cool? What are different porcupine quills teaching us about medicine? What makes some people more likely to be bitten by mosquitoes than others? All the answers and more lie in the secrets of how skin protects us from a hostile world. When it comes to protecting our delicate insides, skin is like an external suit of armour. Animals have adapted ways of protecting themselves from everything a hostile planet has to throw at them.

Hippos produce their own sunscreen to protect themselves against the dangers of UV rays from the sun. Only recently discovered by science, is the truth behind a giraffe’s spots, a network of blood vessels that they use to cool themselves down in the blazing heat of the African savannah.

Professor Ben Garrod discovers how. He tests the limitations of human skin by plunging himself into a deep freezer to demonstrate how human skin just isn’t well insulated enough to cope with extreme cold. He discovers how human skin is an entire ecosystem for bugs and bacteria as he comes face to face with what is growing on his skin. And he gets bitten by mosquitoes and stable flies as he learns that disease-carrying insects have evolved to pierce everything from human skin to horse hide.


TUE 01:20 Great American Railroad Journeys (b09pw36m)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 today]


TUE 01:50 Iolo's Snowdonia (b09qqnxv)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:30 today]


TUE 02:20 Prejudice and Pride: The People's History of LGBTQ Britain (b08zn99q)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:00 today]



WEDNESDAY 15 JUNE 2022

WED 19:00 Great American Railroad Journeys (b09pw6cx)
Series 3

Boston to Concord, Massachusetts

Michael Portillo's 19th-century Appleton's guidebook leads him to the Parker House Hotel, where in his best pinny, he whisks up a Boston cream pie.

In the fine dome atop Massachusetts General Hospital, where no-one could hear the screaming, Michael discovers the scene of grisly surgery, first made bearable in 1846 by a miraculous new substance. North of Boston, in Salem, Michael is caught up in a witch hunt. He gets a taste of the hysteria which gripped the town in the 17th century and how events were re-interpreted at the time of his guide.

And in Concord, where the first shots of the American Revolution were fired, Michael discovers the home of the celebrated author of the coming of age classic Little Women and hears the story behind the novel.


WED 19:30 Iolo's Snowdonia (b09qtryj)
Series 1

Episode 2

It's summer and peak season on the summit of Snowdon. It's time for Iolo to get away from the crowds to look for peaceful, stunning scenery and spectacular wildlife. In secret hidden sites, he finds buzzards nesting, beautiful dragonflies and night-flying moths being hunted by migrant nightjars from Africa. There's a colony of rare silver-studded blue butterflies who were once living by the sea but today have been isolated inland as the coastline has changed.

Iolo also climbs Cadair Idris, the highest peak in the southern part of the park, and explores extraordinary sand dunes full of colourful orchids along Snowdonia's 30 miles of stunning coast. But summer isn't complete for Iolo without a day on the moors watching the most threatened bird of prey in Britain - the hen harrier.


WED 20:00 The Story of Welsh Art (p097c3k8)
Series 1

Episode 3

In this final episode, Huw Stephens’s journey begins at the dawn of the 20th century with the artists who broke with tradition and depicted Wales in radical new ways. In Snowdonia, he learns how Augustus John and JD Innes led the way, obsessively painting the landscape with a freedom and vibrancy that still dazzles today. Equally bold was the output of Gwen John, whose work is in complete contrast to that of her brother Augustus. At the National Museum Wales in Cardiff, Huw discovers how she used light and tone to paint delicate and hypnotic portraits and interior scenes.

Between the wars, industrial south Wales produced some of the most powerful art of the century. Huw discovers how the work of Evan Walters and Cedric Morris is steeped in their experience of mining communities and the desperate poverty they endured. The lives of striking miners were rarely reflected in art, but Walters’s 1926 portrait of his friend William Hopkins captured his subject with dignity and honesty.

Travelling north, Huw heads out to Bardsey Island off the Llyn Peninsula, a place he first visited as a teenager. The landscape of Wales has long been a source of inspiration for artists and in the 1940s Brenda Chamberlain moved to Bardsey to immerse herself in its isolation. Inside the picturesque cottage where she lived, Huw sees her sketches of island life that she drew on the walls ‘as if they were a giant sketchbook’. At the same time, Kyffin Williams was painting the distinctive, dramatic landscapes of north Wales, establishing himself as the most popular Welsh artist of the 20th century.

Contemporary art in Wales reflects a post-devolution self-confidence that allows it to look both back and forward. In Swansea, Huw meets Daniel Trivedy and learns how his award-winning work Welsh Emergency Blanket took the patterns of traditional Welsh blankets and printed them on to the silver foil coverings given to refugees rescued from the sea. For his final stop, Huw visits Colwyn Bay where he meets internationally renowned artist Bedwyr Williams, whose work draws heavily on Welsh art history using humour and irreverence. It is a unique history, Bedwyr concludes, and one that makes him excited to be living and working in north Wales.


WED 21:00 Thatcher: A Very British Revolution (m0005hkn)
Series 1

Power

Mrs Thatcher's victory in the 1979 general election propels her into power as Britain's first female prime minister. On the steps of Downing Street she promises "hope" and "harmony" but her first two years are characterised by disruption and division.

Her first cabinet is split between a small group who are aligned with her plans for radical change, but the majority are experienced ministers from the traditional power base of the party who prefer a more consensual style of politics. From day one there is friction between Mrs Thatcher and some of her senior colleagues.

She also confronts an economy that is in deep trouble. All the indicators are pointing in the wrong direction with inflation rising, unemployment spiralling and public spending growing. The government have to raise taxes and interest rates but these tend to make things worse. A year after taking power Mrs Thatcher sees the economy plunge into the deepest recession since the great depression.

As the heavy industries that are the backbone of many British communities collapse, unemployment starts to climb. Mrs Thatcher refuses to reinflate the economy and invest millions in failing industries. She gains a public reputation as uncaring and harsh that will become part of her image and her legacy. Within her own party there is deep dispute about economic policy and she is forced into a famous conference speech asserting her determination, stating “You turn if you want to. The lady’s not for turning”.

Within the cabinet, Mrs Thatcher’s style creates tensions. Many of her colleagues find her demanding and argumentative and she finds many of them indecisive and insufficiently committed to her political philosophy. In stark contrast her close staff however find her an unusually sympathetic and attentive boss.

1981 is a year of unrest and change. Serious riots scar British inner cities with many pointing the finger at Mrs Thatcher and her policies as the cause of the trouble. In government Mrs Thatcher’s doubters are emboldened and seek to force her into a change of direction. But the prime minister refuses to relent and moves against her critics removing them from the cabinet and bringing in allies who will back her as she leads Britain into the turbulence of the 1980s.

Featuring interviews with the surviving members of her first cabinet, John Nott, Michael Heseltine, Norman Fowler and David Howell, her private secretaries Tim Lankester, John Cole and Nick Sanders, her personal assistant Cynthia Crawford, her protection officer Barry Strevens, Downing Street secretary Janice Richards and press secretary Bernard Ingham. We also hear from senior Conservatives who were close to her, including Michael Dobbs, Lord Gowrie, Jonathan Aitken, Norman Tebbit, Kenneth Baker and Nigel Lawson, as well as political opponent David Owen.


WED 22:00 Tumbledown (b0074mwj)
April 1982: The British task force sails for the South Atlantic. Among their number is 22-year-old Robert Lawrence, an officer in the elite regiment of Scots Guards. On the bleak hills of the Falkland Islands they fight and win a series of bloody battles. For many of the soldiers it is a violent initiation into active combat, but for Robert, wounded hours before the Argentine surrender, the real battle begins when he returns home.


WED 23:55 Secret Agent Selection: WW2 (b0b060kj)
Series 1

Episode 2

In episode two, training proper begins as the students are schooled in guns, explosives and silent killing techniques - skills which came together and helped SOE to pull off one of the most audacious assassinations of World War Two. The students need to show a calm head and a killer instinct when handling real weapons, but not everyone makes the grade.


WED 00:55 Great American Railroad Journeys (b09pw6cx)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 today]


WED 01:25 Iolo's Snowdonia (b09qtryj)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:30 today]


WED 01:55 The Story of Welsh Art (p097c3k8)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:00 today]


WED 02:55 Thatcher: A Very British Revolution (m0005hkn)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:00 today]



THURSDAY 16 JUNE 2022

THU 19:00 Great American Railroad Journeys (b09pw85k)
Series 3

Plymouth to Nantucket

Led by his Appleton's guidebook and tracing the footsteps of the Pilgrim Fathers, Michael Portillo heads for Plymouth, the home town of America. He learns how indigenous tribes of Wamponoag people taught the newly arrived settlers to live off the land, the inspiration for one of the biggest holidays in the American calendar.

Michael boards the vibrant Cape Cod Central heritage railway bound for Hyannis, a favourite spot for vacationing presidents. Catching a ferry to Martha's Vineyard, Portillo discovers that ardent Methodists put the island on the map by establishing the country's first religious summer camp in the early 19th century.

Moving on to the island of Nantucket, Michael discovers how hardy New Englanders made vast fortunes from whale oil at a time when Nantucket was the whaling capital of the world. Out at sea, he joins conservationists and whale spotters hoping for a glimpse these magnificent creatures.


THU 19:30 Coast (b0959vtk)
Series 8 Reversions

All at Sea 3

A group of sea anglers from Zimbabwe chance their hand in the rolling seas off the coast of Yorkshire. On their annual day trip from Whitby, they find themselves all at sea.


THU 19:45 Parkinson (m000z8tm)
Hollywood Women

Michael Parkinson looks back at his meetings with Hollywood's leading ladies, including Bette Davis, Raquel Welch, Bette Midler, Lauren Bacall, Ingrid Bergman and Miss Piggy.


THU 20:30 More Dawn French's Girls Who Do: Comedy (b0074swp)
Series 1

Whoopi Goldberg

Dawn French talks to Whoopi Goldberg about her life in comedy.


THU 21:00 The Color Purple (m0012jfs)
Celie, a poor black girl, fights to hold on to her self-esteem when she is separated from her sister and forced into a brutal marriage. Spanning the years 1909 to 1947 in a small Georgia town, the film chronicles the joys, pains and people in her life.

Adapted by Steven Spielberg from Alice Walker's seminal novel.


THU 23:25 The Sky at Night (m0018b4q)
[Repeat of broadcast at 22:00 on Monday]


THU 00:25 Horizon (m000kqm9)
[Repeat of broadcast at 21:00 on Monday]


THU 01:25 Great American Railroad Journeys (b09pw85k)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 today]


THU 01:55 Parkinson (m000z8tm)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:45 today]


THU 02:40 Francesco's Mediterranean Voyage (b00cl5zl)
[Repeat of broadcast at 22:40 on Saturday]


THU 03:10 Francesco's Mediterranean Voyage (b00cl6nw)
[Repeat of broadcast at 23:10 on Saturday]



FRIDAY 17 JUNE 2022

FRI 19:00 Fathers and Songs: Music for Father's Day (b02yhsb6)
Fatherhood has proved a great subject for a variety of artists - some celebratory, some conflicted, but all inspired by what dad does and doesn't do. Here's a mixture of songs that celebrate and probe the emotional complexities generated by the sometime head of the household.

Kid Creole and the Coconuts, Cat Stevens, Emmylou Harris, Paul Simon, Madonna, Peter Gabriel, Mike and the Mechanics, Suggs and the Blockheads, Neil Young, James Brown, Pigbag and even Ozzy Osbourne and his daughter Kelly put in an appearance, making a cracking compilation for Father's Day.


FRI 20:00 Top of the Pops (m0018b82)
Mark Franklin presents the pop chart programme, first broadcast on 4 February 1993 and featuring M People, Duran Duran, Def Leppard, The Beloved, Rapination ft Kym Mazelle, Gloworm, Sting and Whitney Houston.


FRI 20:30 Top of the Pops (m0018b84)
Mark Franklin presents the pop chart programme, first broadcast on 18 February 1993 and featuring Stereo MC's, Whitney Houston, Lenny Kravitz, Sting, Take That, Paul McCartney and 2 Unlimited.


FRI 21:00 Glastonbury (m0018b86)
Brian Wilson at Glastonbury 2005

Legendary Beach Boys frontman and songwriter brings his classic hits to Worthy Farm.


FRI 22:15 Elvis: The Rebirth of the King (b09kkkbx)
The widely accepted Elvis narrative is that the Vegas period was the nadir of his career, but this film argues that Elvis reached his peak both as a singer and performer in the first few years of his Vegas period. He became, in those short years, the greatest performer on earth. The film tracks this five-year renaissance with some of his key musical and artistic collaborators of the period, including the creator of his most memorable jumpsuits, to celebrate the greatest pop reinvention of all time.


FRI 23:15 ...Sings Elvis (b00pqcg3)
2011 marked the 75th anniversary of Elvis Presley's birth and was celebrated by a host of performances by artists covering the King's classic songs culled from the BBC archives.

Some of Britain's biggest stars were introduced to rock n roll as teenagers via their idol Elvis, and Cliff Richard, Paul McCartney, Tom Jones and John Cale all pay their tribute. The original songwriters of some of Elvis's greatest hits perform their own versions of classic tracks, including Carl Perkins singing Blue Suede Shoes and Mac Davis doing In the Ghetto.

Other artists paying homage from across five decades include The Deep River Boys, the Stylistics, Boy George, Alison Moyet, Pet Shop Boys and Robbie Williams. There will be jumpsuits, pelvic thrusts, brilliant tunes ... and Glen Campbell's Elvis impersonation.


FRI 00:15 50s Britannia (b01sgbw2)
Rock 'n' Roll Britannia

Long before the Beatles there was British rock 'n' roll. Between 1956 and 1960 British youth created a unique copy of a distant and scarce American original whilst most parents, professional jazz men and even the BBC did their level best to snuff it out.

From its first faltering steps as a facsimile of Bill Haley's swing style to the sophistication of self-penned landmarks such as Shakin' All Over and The Sound of Fury, this is the story of how the likes of Lord Rockingham's XI, Vince Taylor and Cliff Richard and The Shadows laid the foundations for an enduring 50-year culture of rock 'n' roll.

Now well into their seventies, the flame still burns strong in the hearts of the original young ones. Featuring Sir Cliff Richard, Marty Wilde, Joe Brown, Bruce Welch, Cherry Wainer and The Quarrymen.


FRI 01:15 Top of the Pops (m0018b82)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:00 today]


FRI 01:45 Top of the Pops (m0018b84)
[Repeat of broadcast at 20:30 today]


FRI 02:15 Fathers and Songs: Music for Father's Day (b02yhsb6)
[Repeat of broadcast at 19:00 today]