The Singapore Grip

September

ITV

Winston Churchill called the fall of Singapore to the Japanese in 1942 “the worst disaster and largest capitulation in British history”. Whatever the truth, it was certainly an ignominious moment as a vital stronghold was lost in part because of sheer incompetence.

It’s an era revisited in a new six-part drama from ITV. Based on JG Farrell’s satirical novel and scripted by the Oscarwinning Christopher Hampton ( Dangerous Liaisons), it shows life in Singapore largely from the perspective of the Blacketts, headed by rubber merchant Walter (David Morrissey), who initially seems blithely unaware of the gathering danger to his privileged way of life. A strong cast also includes Charles Dance as Blackett’s urbane business partner, Mr Webb, and Jane Horrocks as Walter’s wife, Sylvia.

My Family, The Holocaust And Me

September (TBC)

BBC One

As we were going to press, we were told that a new two-part documentary featuring Robert ‘Judge’ Rinder exploring the impact of the Holocaust is likely to be in the early autumn schedules. The programme is in great part inspired by Robert’s 2018 episode of Who Do You Think You Are?, and teases out how the Holocaust even now casts a shadow over families who lost relations. Keep an eye on whodo youthinkyouaremagazine.com, where we’ll publish an interview with Robert nearer transmission.

The Curious Life And Death Of…

Tuesday 8 September, 8pm The Smithsonian Channel Medical historian Dr Lindsey Fitzharris describes herself as a “conveyor of nightmare-inducing history”. The perfect host then for a series featuring “virtual autopsies” to determine how and why figures such as murderer Lizzie Borden and Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones met their end.

Battle Of Britain 80: Allies At War

Monday 14 September, 9pm Sky History

On the eve of Battle of Britain Day, when in 1940 the Royal Air Force fought off two huge attacks against London by the Luftwaffe, Sky History offers a trio of films marking the 80th anniversary of one of the key campaigns of the Second World War, and celebrating “the few” and those who kept them flying.

The first documentary focuses on June and July 1940, when Britain’s military somehow found the strength to regroup after the disastrous retreat from France. The programme also remembers the Polish and Czech pilots who escaped POW camps and took to the air to protect our skies.

Then Battle of Britain: the Race for Radar (10pm) tells the inside story of how Britain developed its radar network, including the tale of how the Germans sent a Zeppelin to probe the secrets of a chain of coastal towers that had appeared around Britain.

Finally, The Battle of Britain (11pm) kicks off a three-part series that uses rarely seen footage to help tell the story of a momentous summer.