Who Do You Think You Are?
AVAILABLE ON BBC IPLAYER
This excellent programme in which well-known figures explore their family history returns for a new series.
The first episode features comedian and broadcaster Sue Perkins who grew up in Croydon and says she has been thinking more about her ancestors and heritage since the death of her father in 2017. She begins her journey of discovery with a visit to see her best friend and sometime comedy partner Mel Giedroyc to go through some family photographs together in which both her grandmothers figure quite prominently.
“A lot of my life has been about propulsion… going forward,” Perkins says and she attributes this to the fact that her mother’s side of the family were immigrants from Germany. However, she discovers that her drive may also have something to do with the survival instinct of the paternal grandfather she never knew.
Perkins begins by exploring that side of her family which stretches back a long way as her grandfather was in his sixties when her father was born. It transpires that he had a difficult childhood – orphaned at a young age, he spent some time in the workhouse and then joined the Army as a teenager.
On her mother’s side, Perkins discovers a harrowing story about her German family who were originally from Lithuania, but during the Second World War had been displaced and spent time in a Nazi internment camp.
Other celebrities involved in this series include writer and broadcaster Richard Osman, actors Ralf Little and Anna Maxwell Martin and comedian Matt Lucas.