History TV and radio in the UK: what's on our screens this week?
Can't decide which shows to watch or listen to this week? Here are the latest history radio and TV programmes airing in the UK that you won't want to miss
The Documentary: The Romani Holocaust – An Unfinished History
BBC World Service
Saturday 20th July, 12.05pm
The Nazis regarded the Romani as being enemies of the race-based state. The Romani’s subsequent history paralleled that of the Jewish people, yet it’s a history that is even now little understood. Historian Celia Donert shines light on a tale of contested memory and explores why ‘Romaphobia’ is still so widespread.
MH17: The Plane Crash That Shook The World
Channel 4
Saturday 20th July, 8pm
With the benefit of hindsight, the downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17, struck by a Russian-made missile in 2014 with the loss of 298 lives, was a key moment in the escalation of tension between Russia and its neighbours. A documentary charting how the tragedy triggered a secret war.
Britain Behind Bars: A Secret History
Channel 4
Sunday 21st July, 9pm
Barrister Rob Rinder presents a series investigating the lives of those who have spent time behind bars. In the first of three episodes, he visit HMP Dartmoor, where he tells the story of former prisoner Joseph Denny, who in 1890 broke back into the jail because he wanted to murder a warder who had mistreated him.
Policing Protest
Radio 4
Monday 22nd July, 11am
Over three episodes, Mark Easton, the BBC’s home affairs editor, explores the history of policing protests in the UK. It’s a story that goes back to the Peterloo massacre of 1819. The horrific events that day played into Metropolitan Police founder Robert Peel’s ideas around ‘policing by consent’.
Art That Conquered The World: The Hay Wain
Radio 4
Tuesday 23rd July, 4pm
What makes a painting become so famous that it’s almost overly familiar? Art historian Dr James Fox traces how Constable’s The Hay Wain, a quintessentially English canvas, made its way to cultural ubiquity via, unlikely as it seems, the Louvre. Featuring the insights of Christine Riding of the National Gallery.
London ’48: How Britain Saved The Olympics
Channel 5
Tuesday 23rd July, 9pm
When London was picked to host the Olympics in 1948, there were doubts over whether Britain, its capital still scarred by conflict and hugely in debt, could pull off the task of welcoming the world’s athletes. As this documentary recounts, the successful games that followed were staged on a tiny budget and represented a small miracle of improvisation.
Drama: The Poor Olympics And The Flying Housewife
Radio 4
Thursday 25th July, 2.15pm
Based on a true story, writer and director Sean Grundy’s drama takes us back to the 1948 Olympics in austerity London. It’s a tale both of sporting rivalry, between British athletes and Dutch runner Fanny Blankers-Koe, dubbed ‘The Flying Housewife’, and of how women athletes battled the chauvinistic British sporting establishment and press.
Linford – pick of the week
BBC One
Thursday 25th July, 8.30pm
Sprinter Linford Christie remains one of Britain’s most famous athletes, a man who won Olympic gold but suffered in the media spotlight. This feature-length documentary, made with the cooperation of the man himself, looks back at his life and times, and reveals much about toxic and racist attitudes in Britain 30 years ago.
Richard Eyre Remembers… Country
BBC Four
Thursday 25th July, 9pm
The veteran director looks back on his work on dramatist Trevor Griffiths’ landmark Play For Today, Country, set in a grand house in 1945 at the time of the Labour landslide that brought Clement Attlee to power. Followed by the play itself, starring Leo McKern as Sir Frederick Carlion and first broadcast in 1981.
Tricky Dick
Sky History
Thursday 25th July, 9pm
As a politician, Richard Milhous Nixon was a remarkable figure. Having lost to John F Kennedy in the 1960 US presidential election, he staged an unlikely comeback and led his country between 1969 and 1975, only to be disgraced over the Watergate scandal. This four-part documentary series tells the story of Nixon’s rise and fall.
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