After 200 years under lock and key, all the personal papers of one of our most important monarchs are for the first time seeing the light of day. In the first documentary to gain extensive access to the Royal Archives, Robert Hardman sheds fascinating new light on George III, Britain's longest reigning king. George III may be chiefly remembered for his madness, but these private documents reveal a monarch who was a political micromanager and a restless patron of science and the arts, an obsessive traveller who never left southern England yet toured the world in his mind and a man who was driven (sometimes to distraction) by his sense of duty to his family and his country. Featuring Simon Callow and Sian Thomas as the voices of King George and Queen Charlotte.
09 Oct 2021
A profile of the Czech-born member of the British Royal Family, who married the Queen's first cousin Prince Michael of Kent in 1978 following a five-year courtship. Princess Michael became one of the Royal Family's most colourful members - in 1985 her father was revealed to have served in the SS for 11 years, embroiling the Windsors in lurid tabloid stories.
28 Apr 2023
A documentary special that provides a rare view into the real Charles behind the headlines… told in his own words.
24 Jul 2017
A fresh and revealing insight into Princess Diana through the personal and intimate reflections of her two sons and her friends and family.
05 May 2025
Documentary looking back at a Britain during the darkest days of WWII using stunning new archived footage and interviews with people who lived through it.
15 Mar 2024
A look at Britain's beloved canal network via a fact-filled cruise along the first superhighways of the Industrial Revolution. In the age before mechanisation, a frenzy of canal-building saw a new army of workers carve out the British landscape, digging out hundreds of miles of waterways using picks, shovels and muscle.
06 Aug 2017
Using home videos recorded by her voice coach, Diana takes us through the story of her life.
08 Apr 2024
In the blistering hot summer of 1984, a sadistic predator is terrorising rural Britain. This is the story of the desperate police manhunt for The Fox, one of the most prolific and depraved offenders in British criminal history.
27 May 2023
An exclusive interview with Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex, in which he talks in-depth to Tom Bradby, journalist and ITV News at Ten presenter, covering a range of subjects including his personal relationships, never-before-heard details surrounding the death of his mother, Diana, and a look ahead at his future. The 90-minute programme was broadcast two days before Prince Harry’s autobiography ‘Spare’ was published on 10 January.
13 Dec 2011
Windsor Castle is a wonderful living example of the power and tradition of the Royal Family. For nearly 1,000 years it has stood as a symbol of the monarchy's strength, it is the largest working castle in the world and is still a cared for home of the Royal Family. But on one fateful day all that was threatened. On the morning of November 20th, 1992, fire broke out in the castle.It was a threat that nearly destroyed a building that centuries of warfare and change had not even dented. The blaze raced through state apartments, the Royal Chapel, St George's Hall, bedrooms and corridors, wiping out almost everything in its path. This is the story of that fire, as told by those who witnessed it and by those for whom Windsor Castle is a home. But it is also the amazing story of the astonishing effort that was made to restore the castle to its former glory and prove that there was life for Windsor Castle after the fire.
07 May 2013
Wallis Simpson is one of the most reviled women of the 20th century. It was to marry this twice-divorced American that King Edward VIII of England renounced the throne in 1936, after less than a year on the throne. Born in Pennsylvania in 1896, Wallis, orphaned of her father, grew up in precarious conditions, and very early on relied on marriage to advance socially. But her matrimonial choices were far from always happy. From 1935 onwards, her affair with Crown Prince Edward opened the doors to "a shimmering new world", but it also made her the target of numerous rumors and public animosity.
31 Jul 2017
This illuminating documentary examines the aftermath of Princess Diana's tragic death and the tense, dramatic week leading up to her funeral
19 Apr 2025
Fifty years ago, Princess Anne was one of the most eligible women in the world, but dashing soldier and fellow equestrian Captain Mark Phillips was the one to win her hand. When they tied the knot in a fairy-tale ceremony at Westminster Abbey in November 1973, it would thrust Anne into the limelight like never before and set a precedent for all future royal weddings. Interviewees include former royal reporter Angela Rippon, who talks about the couple's courtship, and the groom's best man Eric Grounds, with detail of the stag do.
13 May 2020
Lucy Worsley tells the story of the royal photograph, showing how the royal family worked with generations of photographers to create images that reinvented the British monarchy.
30 May 2022
Decades after her untimely death, Princess Diana continues to evoke mystery, glamour, and the quintessential modern fairy tale gone wrong. As a symbol of both the widening fissures weakening the British monarchy and the destructive machinery of the press, the Princess of Wales navigated an unparalleled rise to fame and the corrosive challenges that came alongside it. Crafted entirely from immersive archival footage and free from the distraction of retrospective voices, this hypnotic and audaciously revealing documentary takes a distinctive formal approach, allowing the story of the People’s Princess to unfold before us like never before.
03 May 2018
This documentary charts Harry's journey through important turning points in his life - four other royal weddings and the death of his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales. Along the way it touches on the prince's active service as a soldier in Afghanistan and his international charity work.
30 Apr 2023
This is the story of how a prince became a king, a revealing portrait of our new monarch across the seven decades he spent as heir to the throne. It’s a journey from cradle to crown told almost solely in his own words, from film and television recordings to private home movies and featuring a wealth of material, some of which has never been seen before. As well as drawing on home movies from the Royal Collection, the film-makers were given exclusive access to sequences featuring the prince, shot for the landmark 1969 film Royal Family, including private unseen moments.
19 Jan 2012
Augustus Northmore Welby Pugin is far from being a household name, yet he designed the iconic clock tower of Big Ben as well as much of the Palace of Westminster. The 19th-century Gothic revival that Pugin inspired, with its medieval influences and soaring church spires, established an image of Britain which still defines the nation. Richard Taylor charts Pugin's extraordinary life story and discovers how his work continues to influence Britain today.
13 Dec 2012
Timeshift turns back the clock to a time when villains wore silver capes, grannies swooned at the sight of bulky men in latex and the most masculine man in the country was called Shirley. In its heyday, British professional wrestling attracted huge TV audiences and made household names of generations of wrestlers from Mick McManus and Jackie 'Mr TV' Pallo to Giant Haystacks and Big Daddy. With contributions from inside the world of wrestling and surprising fans such as artist Peter Blake, this is an affectionate and lively portrait of a lost era of simpler pleasures, both in and out of the ring.
24 Aug 2019
Professor Saul David examines Prince Albert's role in shaping British culture, governmental policy and international relations in Victorian Britain.
Newsreel coverage of the Prince and Princess of Wales' visit of the 1896 Cardiff Exhibition. Now a lost film, it's considered the first time the British Royal Family was filmed.