THE RISE OF THE MURDOCH DYNASTY

BBC Two, 9.00pm

Anyone who has seen Succession will find it impossible to watch the opening episode of Jamie Roberts’s three-part series about the Murdoch family without drawing a comparison to the similarly turbulent Roy siblings. The scenesetting early moments hint towards Jesse Armstrong’s drama, making much of which of Rupert Murdoch’s three eldest children – James, Elizabeth and Lachlan – will ultimately end up taking over, a process complicated by Murdoch’s 2016 marriage to Jerry Hall.

We begin in 1995 with Tony Blair’s decision to fly to Hayman Island to convince Murdoch that the New Labour project was worth backing and end with the realisation that the relationship between Murdoch’s business empire and Blair’s government had become so entangled as to be almost impossible to unravel. Along the way there are plenty of opinions from former News International executives and New Labour big hitters (although notably not Blair himself). At the end of the day however, it is an image – the look of horror on Robin Cook’s face as Blair glad-hands the cheering crowd to the strains of Things Can

Only Get Better – that lingers longest.

Sarah Hughes

am Destroyer (1943, b/w) Wartime adventure starring Edward G Robinson (S) pm 7th Cavalry (1956) Western with Randolph Scott (S)

The Great Sioux Massacre (1965) Western starring Philip Carey and Joseph Cotten (S)

Carry On Constable (1960, b/w) Comedy starring Sid James (AD) (S)

Life of Pi (2012) Adventure starring Suraj Sharma and Irrfan Khan (AD) (S)

(2016) A disfigured mercenary develops superhuman powers, which he uses to get payback on the man who ruined his life. Comedy adventure with Ryan Reynolds

See Films of the week, p20 (AD) (S)

- 1.00am Buried (2010) Thriller starring Ryan Reynolds (S)

Family affair: Rupert Murdoch with sons Lachlan and James

I May Destroy You: Lewis Reeves and Michaela Coel