{"id":31366,"date":"2023-11-25T07:44:36","date_gmt":"2023-11-25T07:44:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/onelidlesseye.com\/?p=31366"},"modified":"2023-11-25T07:44:36","modified_gmt":"2023-11-25T07:44:36","slug":"when-the-bbc-cut-this-programme-an-infuriated-queen-mother-rang-up-to-complain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/onelidlesseye.com\/celebrity\/when-the-bbc-cut-this-programme-an-infuriated-queen-mother-rang-up-to-complain\/","title":{"rendered":"When the BBC cut this programme an infuriated Queen Mother rang up to complain"},"content":{"rendered":"

https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/2WoDQBhJCVQ<\/p>\n

If we are to listen to James Burke, \u00adhe\u2019s nothing more than a \u201ctelevision journalist\u201d who writes \u201csecond-rate books\u201d, is no \u201cbetter or worse than most people\u201d at predicting the future and is \u201cway past his sell-by date\u201d. I don\u2019t believe a word of it, of course.<\/p>\n

Not for nothing has the 86-year-old broadcasting titan been named a \u201cfavourite author\u201d by Bill Gates, name-checked by The Human League in their 1980 song The Black Hit of Space (\u201cGet James Burke on the case,\u201d they sang) and hailed as \u201cone of the most intriguing minds in the Western world\u201d by The Washington Post.<\/p>\n

Burke famously hosted the BBC\u2019s flagship science magazine programme Tomorrow\u2019s World (demonstrating the video recorder and anti-shark swimming bag) before \u00adfronting the Apollo 11 Moon Landing in 1969 \u2013 the Corporation\u2019s first ever all-night broadcast. Then, in 1978, he went on to write and present Connections, which was sold to more than 50 countries and achieved the highest audience for documentaries in the history of the US PBS network.<\/p>\n

It was during this series that he recorded what is widely applauded \u00adas \u201cthe best-timed shot in television \u00adhistory\u201d.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Explaining the connection between the invention of the thermos flask and space travel, he delivered his piece to camera: \u201cIf you release those two gases into a confined space with a hole at the other end of it and mix them as you do so, and then, set light to them, you get… that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burke then pointed into the distance \u2013 precisely a second before a Nasa spacecraft took to the heavens carrying the Voyager 2 craft. The sequence now goes viral at regular intervals, much to Burke\u2019s bemusement.<\/p>\n

\u201cPoor souls must be short of material,\u201d he snorts on a video call from his home in the south of France, 500 yards from the Italian border. Characteristically, he insists: \u201cIt was just an ordinary countdown. So all I had to do was speak for exactly 12 seconds, which is what I can do \u2013 what I get paid to do.\u201d When I suggest he\u2019s being overly modest, he furrows his brow behind his trademark specs (much more slimline than in his 1960s heyday) before correcting me: \u201cNo, no no! I\u2019m not modest. Nasa is extremely precise. I knew that dead on to the split-second, the rocket would go, and it did.\u201d<\/p>\n

Forty-five years on from the first instalment, he is returning to our screens for a new set of Connections, not for the BBC \u2013 which, he says, has been forced by budget cuts to slash documentary making \u2013 but a global streamer, Curiosity Stream.<\/p>\n

Burke says the reason he wanted to do it is simple: \u201cI got bored\u201d, plus he was asked. \u201cWell, I was approached by a couple of Americans actually, in the middle of nowhere, saying \u2018Do you want to do any more TV? Or are you dead?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

In each of the six episodes, he follows a dizzying chain of links to show how seemingly unrelated ideas connect across centuries.<\/p>\n

Unlike previous series, which concluded in the present day, these programmes end with a prediction of a future breakthrough that will transform the world. Frederick the Great\u2019s coffee paves the way for designer genetics and 19th-century ship-boring worms bring us to AI.<\/p>\n

Allowing himself a rare moment of pride, Burke says: \u201cI love the moment I found in programme five \u2013 that there was a great place to start with Napoleon\u2019s toothpick. And as it was going to end up with predictive analytics [a quantum computer so powerful that it can predict the future], I thought that was a pretty nice jump.\u201d<\/p>\n