There were two exceptional programmes this week.
The first was the incomparable Judi Dench in a programme called Shakespeare and Me. Judi is now almost blind as a consequence of macular disease (which I also have) but her memory of every Shakespearean part she has ever played is perfection. To hear her deliver two of the great speeches was heartstopping and took me back many, many years when we used to travel to Stratford and camp out so we could see the great actors there. And, extraordinarily, the genealogists had discovered that her eight times great grandfather was a courtier at the royal house of Denmark and was at a performance of Hamlet which Shakespeare himself was at.
The other was David Attenborough, now 99, and as wonderful as ever, describing the wildlife of London. London is the greenest great city in the world with 40% of it green space and over 3000 parks. He lives in Richmond in the west of the city but the programme touched on all four quarters with some astonishing pieces of film. There were peregrine falcons nesting in the Houses of Parliament, harvest mice in a meadow in West London, flocks of ring necked parakeets in Hither Green cemetery and most astonishing of all, large but harmless snakes along the Regent's Canal. There were hedgehogs, dragonflies, frogs, fallow deer and , of course, the ubiquitous fox - 30 per km - who have all made a home here and thrive, adapting themselves to life in London.
It was one of the most entrancing programmes I’ve ever seen and if you missed it, you can catch it on iplayer.
The first was the incomparable Judi Dench in a programme called Shakespeare and Me. Judi is now almost blind as a consequence of macular disease (which I also have) but her memory of every Shakespearean part she has ever played is perfection. To hear her deliver two of the great speeches was heartstopping and took me back many, many years when we used to travel to Stratford and camp out so we could see the great actors there. And, extraordinarily, the genealogists had discovered that her eight times great grandfather was a courtier at the royal house of Denmark and was at a performance of Hamlet which Shakespeare himself was at.
The other was David Attenborough, now 99, and as wonderful as ever, describing the wildlife of London. London is the greenest great city in the world with 40% of it green space and over 3000 parks. He lives in Richmond in the west of the city but the programme touched on all four quarters with some astonishing pieces of film. There were peregrine falcons nesting in the Houses of Parliament, harvest mice in a meadow in West London, flocks of ring necked parakeets in Hither Green cemetery and most astonishing of all, large but harmless snakes along the Regent's Canal. There were hedgehogs, dragonflies, frogs, fallow deer and , of course, the ubiquitous fox - 30 per km - who have all made a home here and thrive, adapting themselves to life in London.
It was one of the most entrancing programmes I’ve ever seen and if you missed it, you can catch it on iplayer.
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