Fertility problems and bandy legs, dysfunctional family relationships, heavy drinking and morbid obesity… some of our monarchs have been sorry specimens indeed.

And yet historian Lucy Worsley, whose day job is chief curator of Historic Royal Palaces, believes the British monarchy survives not through its strengths, but through the frailty of generations of royals. 

‘It’s counterintuitive,’ Lucy says, beaming a mischievous smile. Let’s hope her new BBC2 series Fit To Rule: How Royal Illness Changed History doesn’t cripple her prospects of becoming Dame Lucy.

The series suggests it was the weaknesses of our monarchs that forced the institution to adapt through centuries of political upheaval and social change. 

For Lucy, examining their medical records and their most intimate belongings is poignant evidence of the frailty of kings.

‘There was no royal body part too intimate or royal body fluid too unsavoury to evade attention,’ she says, peering into a Tudor chamber pot excavated from Henry VIII’s garden at Hampton Court. Henry couldn’t pass water without it being scrutinised by his gentleman of the bedchamber. The King’s health, after years of civil unrest, was the health of the nation.

Sadly for our royals, they’ve never been given much privacy. ‘There isn’t a single one of them I don’t have some sympathy for,’ says Lucy. Henry’s physician prescribed Viagra substitutes – goat’s testicles flavoured with marjoram – for potency.

The King’s fertility problems and desperation for a son changed the course of history when he broke with Rome to divorce Catherine of Aragon. His daughter Mary, in her turn, despaired of ever having a child to secure a Catholic succession and suffered a humiliating false pregnancy, though her swollen belly was probably caused by the cancer that killed her. 

Hardly surprising then that Elizabeth I, as the Virgin Queen, refused to take up the biological challenge to reproduce.

When James I succeeded with an heir, a spare and a daughter, it seemed the monarchy had achieved stability, despite James’s homosexuality – and his jealous love for his good-looking favourite the Duke of Buckingham. But James’s sexual peccadilloes had psychological repercussions. 

One of the most poignant objects Lucy produces is the pair of orthopaedic boots – from the Museum of London – worn by James’s son Charles, who suffered from rickets. 

Growing up with a stammer and low self-esteem, overshadowed by his dashing older brother Henry – who died prematurely of typhoid – and his father’s much younger lover Buckingham, Charles’s hypersensitivity to slights brought about the intractable stubborness that led to his downfall.

Unfit to rule, King Charles I was beheaded in 1649. 

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(Source: Daily Mail)

An award-winning documentary where twenty-nine royals says openly about their own family’s incredible story.

The documentary focuses on a poor German prince made to Denmark’s King Christian IX, and when his six children are married into the dominant European royalI houses, the Fredensborg Palace meeting place for European royalty. 

The documentary sees comments from Queen Margrethe II, Crown Prince Frederik, Prince Joachim, Prince Michael of Kent, Crown Princes Alexander of Yugoslavia, Constantine II of Greece, and many more…

A must watch, but it is in Danish but the English commentary allows you to follow. 

He was an uneducated peasant who gained a reputation as a faith healer. His strange behavior and incredible influence over the imperial family made him notorious and his death made him a legend.

Really interesting documentary, it is really short, but it gets to the point. Very sick man.

The Queen’s Mother-in-Law reveals one of the Royal Family’s best kept secrets - the bizarre life story of Prince Philip’s mother. A huge ratings hit, 4 million people watched the documentary when it aired in the UK.

We all know about the late Queen Mum - one of Britain’s most instantly recognizable figures. But few have even heard of the Queen’s mother-in-law, Princess Alice. And yet, the life story of Prince Philip’s mother almost defies belief.

A great granddaughter of Queen Victoria, Prince Philip’s mother married into the Greek royal family – only to see the Greek monarchy overthrown by revolution. Fleeing into exile, she suffered a severe nervous breakdown. She was locked away in mental hospitals and subjected to experimental treatments by psychiatrists - including Sigmund Freud himself.

The trauma had a shattering effect on Princess Alice’s marriage and led to a fractured childhood for her only son Prince Philip.

Philip’s mother eventually fought her way back from mental illness, and became an unlikely hero of World War Two - risking her life to hide a Jewish family from the Nazis. When her son married the future Queen Elizabeth in 1948, Alice turned down the option of a cozy royal life. Instead she chose to dedicate herself to working with the poor in Greece, gave away all her possessions and even founded her own religious order.

Featuring exclusive interviews with family members and previously unseen archive footage, this film sheds new light on one of the royal family’s most remarkable but little known personalities.

Produced & Directed by Rob Coldstream. A Blink Films Production for Channel 4.

Series in which art critic Andrew Graham-Dixon presents the incredible story of Russian art - its mystery and magnificence - until now untold on British television.

He explores the origins of the Russian icon from its roots in Byzantium and the first great Russian icon, Our Lady of Vladimir, to the masterpieces of the country’s most famous icon painter Andrei Rublev.

At the same time as being epic and awe-inspiring, and producing brilliant art, medieval Russia could be a terrifying place. Criss-crossing the epic landscape, Andrew visits the monastery founded by Ivan the Terrible, where Ivan’s favourite forms of torture found inspiration in religious art.

One man would shine a light into Russia’s ‘dark’ ages - Peter the Great who, surprisingly, took as his inspiration Deptford in South London

Episode 2, 3

Britain’s Royal Family is always in the public eye, but the legions of loyal helpers who toil in their palaces and castles are rarely seen or heard from. Now, a new film by Montreal documentary maker John Curtin tells some of their stories.  SERVING THE ROYALS: INSIDE THE FIRM, takes us behind the scenes, where 1200 men and women cater to royalty’s every whim. They iron the Queen’s bed sheets, polish Philip’s riding boots, squeeze Charles’s toothpaste onto his toothbrush and walk the royal corgis. Privy to the monarchy’s most intimate secrets, they are its biggest asset and greatest liability.

In SERVING THE ROYALS, Curtin, director of After Elizabeth II: Monarchy in Peril and Chasing the Royals, reveals a fascinating world behind the palace doors, where staff works long hours for low pay. From nannies and butlers to chefs, footmen, body guards and private secretaries, round the clock they labour, often thanklessly, to keep the monarchy humming.

‘Mums the word’ – in fact they are sworn to secrecy - but they see and hear almost everything. It’s all in a day’s work for royal employees who get face time with the Windsors in exchange for cramped living quarters and paltry wages.

“I wanted to tell the stories of some of the people who keep “The Firm” running behind the scenes,” says filmmaker John Curtin, “and take a look at the sometimes fascinating relationships they have with their masters.”

As we see in SERVING THE ROYALS, strong personal relationships often do develop between the royals and their servants. William Tallon, the Queen Mother’s most trusted servant for 50 years, was a wizard with a drink. The witty and flambouyant ‘Backstairs Billy’ plied his aging boss with gin and champagne “to keep her smiling”.

And Paul Burrell, personal footman to the Queen before becoming butler to Charles and Diana, witnessed the scandalous breakup of the Wales’ marriage at the closest of quarters. In SERVING THE ROYALS, he explains how he smuggled Diana’s lovers into Kensington Palace in the trunk of his car and buried the miscarried baby of a friend of the princess in the palace garden …

But are those close relationships ultimately illusory?  While palace staff is sworn to silence, some have not been above betraying their masters, “spilling the beans” for cash or notoriety. And when that happens, or there is a falling out for any other reason, the servant’s fall is sudden and dramatic. They are immediately booted from the palace, cast aside and shunned as persona non grata.

Princess Diana was critical and sometimes deeply jealous of the nannies who took care of her boys. One nanny’s crime: William and Harry had grown too close to her and the nanny once referred to them as “my babies.” Diana even suspected the nanny of having an affair with her husband.

In the immediate future, it will be especially interesting to see what happens now that Prince William and Kate Middleton have a royal baby on the way and are moving back to palace life after Will’s military posting in Wales. Til now, Will and Kate have prided themselves on their un-royal, D.I.Y. lifestyle, but with a baby prince or princess on the way, can the nannies, cooks, valets and chauffeurs be far behind? Will a full retinue of servants destroy the royal couple’s marital bliss, especially for a Prince already deeply suspicious of the hired help?

SERVING THE ROYALS: INSIDE THE FIRM is written, directed, edited and produced by John Curtin in association with CBC-TV.

I think it is a bit sensational but it is interesting, a must watch!!!

(Source: cbc.ca)

Since the birth of rock’n’roll the royal family has had a love/hate relationship with pop music. From John Lennon’s infamous Royal Variety Performance joke about rattling jewellery to the Sex Pistols preaching anarchy in the year of the Silver Jubilee and today’s pop stars lining up to be seen with the young princes, this is the story of the ‘rock and royal years’.

This hour-long documentary helps celebrate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee by looking back at the 60 year relationship between pop and the royals - at the times they came harmoniously together, and at the times when pop republicanism threatened to tear the monarchy apart.

Singer Tommy Steele talks about being one of the first rock’n’rollers to perform in front of the Queen, Sheila Ferguson from the Three Degrees reveals what Prince Charles really said to her at their concert in the run up to his 30th birthday, and Queen guitarist Brian May talks about what it was like to play on top of Buckingham Palace in front of millions of viewers worldwide.

Together these stories reveal why Queen Elizabeth really is ‘the rock’n’roll Queen’.

Its a bit cheeky, but it was entertaining, if you are a pop culture fanatic like myself, then you will like it. 

(Source: channel4.com)