Page 78 - BBC History - September 2017

TV & Radio

ALSO LOOK
OUT FOR…

The impact of history holidays is
investigated in Costing the Earth

Rory Kinnear
plays Robert
– a flamboyant
Victorian
surgeon –
in Quacks

A bloody business The holiday season is upon us. As
Tom Heap reports for Costing the
Quacks Earth (Radio 4, Tuesday 5 Septem-
TV BBC Two of young medical pioneers – respec- ber), this means many of us will
Scheduled for August tively a nervous psychiatrist, a show- journey to historical sites where the
man surgeon, a hedonistic dentist sheer number of visitors is becom-
ing a problem. These include Peru’s
In the 1840s, modern medical science turned anaesthetist and a headstrong
Machu Picchu, at risk from erosion,
was being willed into existence by social reformer – setting out in their
and Venice, where giant cruise
showmen doctors who experimented careers. Naturally, this being played for
liners are a threat to the lagoon
upon themselves and upon each other. laughs, the quartet are as likely to try to environment. Does an answer to
Here was an era when an operating best each other as save lives. these kinds of problems lie in
‘theatre’ was an apt description for an Ensuring historical accuracy, bio- Amsterdam, where the city council
arena where an audience would gather medical research charity the Wellcome thinks it has found a way to tempt
to watch particularly daring surgical Trust is closely involved with the series. visitors to explore beyond the most
procedures – or even just to see an The cast includes Rory Kinnear, Lydia popular attractions?
On BBC Two, the Partition
attempt at an amputation speed record. Leonard and, as a recurring guest, Ru-
season concludes with India’s
If that sounds like the cue for a serious pert Everett, as royal physician Doctor
Partition: The Forgotten Story
documentary, it’s actually the premise Hendrick, a man who loathes innova-
(Tuesday 22 August), in which
for a new sitcom that follows a quartet tion, young people, women and patients.
filmmaker Gurinder Chadha,
director of Bend it Like Beckham
and The Viceroy’s House, crosses
Last testament Samuel L Jackson, with archive India to meet some of those who
footage. Considering Baldwin was were profoundly affected by
I Am Not Your Negro one of the major writers of his Partition, and historians who have
DVD (Altitude Film Distribution, £12.99) generation – an inspiration to Maya distinct takes on the complex
Angelou and Toni Morrison, and a reasons behind the split.
In his later years, Afro-American writer man whose prose could convey Among the shows on Yesterday
James Baldwin (1924–87) worked tenderness or anger with equal are two documentaries that look
on researching a book he planned clarity – it’s quite some task for the back at motor-racing in the days
to call Remember this House. It was director to set himself. when competing was all too often
a way for Baldwin to reflect on a trio Perhaps because the film seems a case of live fast, die young. Look
of assassinated civil rights leaders: imbued with Baldwin’s urgency, his out for Mike Hawthorn: On the
Medgar Evers, Malcolm X and Martin need to see change rather than Limit (Sunday 20 August) and John
Luther King, but also a way into writ- waiting for a political process moving Surtees: One of a Kind (Sunday
ing about his own life. at a glacial pace, it’s a task at 10 September).
He never finished the which Peck succeeds. In Birth of a Movement: The Battle
project, but Raoul doing so, he creates a Against America’s First Block-
Peck’s documentary, work that’s a primer buster (PBS America, Thursday
based largely on for those new to 17 August) tells the little-remem-
30 pages of text Baldwin’s work, and bered story of William Monroe
Baldwin sent to his a meditation on the Trotter, the editor of Afro-American
agent, tries to do troubled history of newspaper the Boston Guardian,
the job for him by US race relations. who tried to get DW Griffith’s The
mixing Baldwin’s In its best moments, Birth of a Nation banned because ALAMY/BBC/GETTY
words, voiced by a mesmerising film. of its racism.

I Am Not Your Negro uses James Baldwin’s
writings to tell the story of race in America

78 BBC History Magazine