BBC Four
Martin Luther King and the March on Washington, BBC Two/MLK: The Assassination Tapes, BBC FourWednesday, 28 August 2013
It was only today I learned that, for copyright reasons, it is impossible to use Martin Luther King’s iconic “I Have A Dream” speech in its entirety without paying a hefty licensing fee to his estate. That knowledge made it easier to understand why... Read more... |
Ancient Greece: The Greatest Show on Earth, BBC FourWednesday, 28 August 2013
Brush up your geography and dust down your history – Dr Michael Scott is investigating the sources of Greek drama and their influence on all theatre to the present day. But he isn’t going to make it easy. The opening instalment of Ancient... Read more... |
BBC Cardiff Singer of the World Competition 2013 Final, BBC FourMonday, 24 June 2013
Once in a blue moon, the judges would seem to have got it wrong. I can think only of 2001, when stunning Latvian mezzo Elina Garanča failed to win the coveted goblet but has since gone on to deserved fame as one of the top half-dozen singers... Read more... |
Quick Cuts, BBC FourThursday, 20 June 2013
You may have thought BBC sitcoms had sunk to the depths with Ben Elton's The Wright Way, but Quick Cuts is giving it a run for its money. The opening episode of a three-part series started last night and, while I'm not a betting woman, I'll... Read more... |
Precision: The Measure of All Things, BBC FourTuesday, 11 June 2013
Given the breadth of Marcus du Sautoy’s cultural scholarship, it was a small surprise that British poet Andrew Marvell wasn't name-checked at the start of the presenter’s new three-parter Precision: The Measure of All Things. “Had we but world... Read more... |
Rock ‘n’ Roll Britannia, BBC FourSaturday, 18 May 2013
From being “a strange facsimile of the original” to generating the “first British record made by people who are 100 per cent convinced that they are doing the right thing”, Rock ‘n’ Roll Britannia breezily mapped the protracted birth of a British... Read more... |
Archaeology: A Secret History, BBC FourWednesday, 01 May 2013
“A bunch of beardies rooting around with trowels. On the lookout for shinbones and such. It’ll be knockout.” There will have been naysayers at the meeting when they first pitched the idea for a series about archaeology and yet nearly 20 years on... Read more... |
Arne Dahl: The Blinded Man - Part One, BBC FourSunday, 07 April 2013
Swedish cop drama Arne Dahl snugly fits BBC Four’s Saturday-evening slot for continental European TV imports, but it also suggests that the well might be running dry. Based on the opening episode there’s not much intrinsically wrong with it, but it’... Read more... |
High Art of the Low Countries, BBC FourFriday, 05 April 2013
There was a time when the art of the Low Countries was considered to be very lowly and base indeed. It was the high art of Italy that counted if you were a person of culture and breeding. Not for you the carousing common folk of Jan Steen, or those... Read more... |
What Do Artists Do All Day?, BBC FourWednesday, 20 March 2013
You might phrase the question rhetorically: “just what do artists do all day?” Or you might ask it in the spirit of genuine enquiry: after all, to many, the artist is an exotic creature whose mystery is still to be fully penetrated. Either way, it’s... Read more... |
The Ballad of Mott the Hoople, BBC FourSaturday, 09 March 2013
“Five years,” said former Mott the Hoople fan club president Kris Needs of the band’s lifespan. “That’s how long the Kaiser Chiefs have been around, but who cares?” It seemed an unfair measure. Mott split 39 years ago and the Leeds quirksters are... Read more... |
Heritage! The Battle to Save Britain's Past, BBC FourFriday, 08 March 2013
He may have been lampooned in his lifetime as the man who kept a pet wasp, but Britain owes much to John Lubbock, the Victorian MP whose legislation gave the country its first bank holiday. His Ancient Monuments bill of 1882 (nicknamed the “... Read more... |
