How To Get Ahead at Medieval Court (2014)
Writer Broadcaster and Newsnight arts correspondent Stephen Smith finds out what it took to get ahead at the court of Richard II.
Writer Broadcaster and Newsnight arts correspondent Stephen Smith finds out what it took to get ahead at the court of Richard II.
Scotland, 1745. After decades of exile, Prince Charles Edward Stuart secretly lands with the purpose of revolting the Highland chieftains against the German House of Hanover, ruler of Great Britain.
A love story offering an intimate look inside the marriage of Winston and Clementine Churchill during a particularly troubled, though little-known, moment in their lives.
Clarissa Dickson Wright tracks down Britain's oldest known cookbook, The Forme of Cury. This 700-year-old scroll was written during the reign of King Richard II from recipes created by the king's master chefs. How did this ancient manuscript influence the way people eat today? On her culinary journey through medieval history she reawakens recipes that have lain dormant for centuries and discovers dishes that are still prepared now.
Was the legendary playwright William Shakespeare really the author of his acclaimed plays? Or was he just a straw man working for a secret society? Norwegian organist and researcher Petter Amundsen claims to have a solid theory on the subject. Shakespearean scholar Robert Crumpton decides to travel to Norway to meet him.
A sumptuous and sensual tale of intrigue, romance and betrayal set against the backdrop of a defining moment in European history: two beautiful sisters, Anne and Mary Boleyn, driven by their family's blind ambition, compete for the love of the handsome and passionate King Henry VIII.
An epic portrayal of the events surrounding the infamous 1819 Peterloo Massacre, where a peaceful pro-democracy rally at St Peter’s Field in Manchester turned into one of the bloodiest and most notorious episodes in British history. The massacre saw British government forces charge into a crowd of over 60,000 that had gathered to demand political reforms and protest against rising levels of poverty.
In the midst of the Hundred Years' War, the young King Henry V of England embarks on the conquest of France in 1415.
Queen Elizabeth II is the longest-reigning monarch in the history of Great Britain and the Commonwealth. While her service to her country is legendary, she has become a figure of strength, endurance, and dignity the world over and indeed we all feel connected to her. Through triumph, loss, scandal, and celebration, witness the story of how a young Princess became Queen to the people of the world.
Henry VIII of England discards his wife, Katharine of Aragon, who has failed to produce a male heir, in favor of the young and beautiful Anne Boleyn.
Popular monarch Queen Christina of Sweden must choose between love and loyalty to her nation when she unexpectedly falls for a Spanish envoy.
In 1940, the Royal Air Force fights a desperate battle against the might of the Luftwaffe for control of the skies over Britain, thus preventing an attempted Nazi invasion.
A 1965 BBC adaptation of William Shakespeare's first historical tetralogy (1 Henry VI, 2 Henry VI, 3 Henry VI and Richard III), which deals with the conflict between the House of Lancaster and the House of York over the throne of England, a conflict known as the Wars of the Roses. It was based on the 1963 theatre adaptation by John Barton, and directed by Peter Hall for the Royal Shakespeare Company.
In May 1940, the fate of World War II hangs on Winston Churchill, who must decide whether to negotiate with Adolf Hitler or fight on knowing that it could mean the end of the British Empire.
His opponents accused him of being homosexual. The male favorites he gathered around him during his short life gave those malevolent enemies solid arguments to do so. He would not have failed if he had proved himself to be an energetic king. But Edward II of England (1284-1327) never was a king like Edward I Longshanks, his father, or Edward III, his son, were. And his end is shrouded in myth and mystery.
Henry Bolingbroke has now been crowned King of England, but faces a rebellion headed by the embittered Earl of Northumberland and his son (nicknamed 'Hotspur'). Henry's son Hal, the Prince of Wales, has thrown over life at court in favour of heavy drinking and petty theft in the company of a debauched elderly knight, Sir John Falstaff. Hal must extricate himself from some legal problems, regain his father's good opinions and help suppress the uprising.
During the Crimean War between Britain and Russia in the 1850s, a British cavalry division, led by the overbearing Lord Cardigan, engages in an infamously reckless strategic debacle against a Russian artillery battery.
The story of corrupt, power-hungry, manipulative Grigori Rasputin's influence on members of the Russian Imperial family and others, and what resulted.
Sir Walter Raleigh overcomes court intrigue to win favor with the Queen in order to get financing for a proposed voyage to the New World.
Historian Lucy Worsley restages the 1840 wedding of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Aided by a team of experts, Worsley recreates the most important elements of the ceremony and the celebrations, scouring history books, archives, newspapers and Queen Victoria's diaries for the details. She reveals how every moment was brilliantly stage-managed for maximum effect. Woven into the recreation of the wedding day is the story of Victoria and Albert's courtship and engagement, and its political importance.
Documentary telling the inside story of the plans by Louis Mountbatten to maneuver his nephew and heir to the Greek throne, Philip, into marrying the future queen Princess Elizabeth and the tensions that that unleashed.