Channel 4 Spring & Summer season 2009

25 March 2009

Channel 4 continues to offer viewers a different perspective on the world with a range of distinctive and compelling new programmes for spring and summer.

Building on successful recent seasons such as Disarming Britain and Can't Read Can't Write, Channel 4 will put the care system under the spotlight in Britain's Forgotten Children, asking why a quarter of the 4,000 children up for adoption each year can't find a family.

The centrepiece of the season, Adopt Me, follows four households of would-be adopters as they take part in a pioneering project to try and find homes for the children no one else wants. The season also features The Unloved, a single drama about a young girl growing up in a children's home, directed by Oscar-nominated actress Samantha Morton. In a film for the Cutting Edge strand, The Homecoming, journalist Rachel Roberts explores the repercussions for children of being in care, while Rageh Omaar will also be reporting on the subject in a special edition of Dispatches.

Having screened the first televised human autopsy in 2002, Channel 4 now turns its attention to the animal kingdom for another TV first. Animal Autopsy (w/t) shows the dissection of a selection of extraordinary creatures - an elephant, a giraffe, a crocodile and a whale. Made in co-operation with the Royal Veterinary College and presented by vet Mark Evans, each dissection will be handled by an expert in the species, while biologist Richard Dawkins explains what the animals' different anatomies reveal about evolution.

A clutch of state-of-the-nation documentary series pepper Channel 4's forthcoming schedule, including Generation XXL (w/t), which examines the obesity epidemic overtaking Britain's children. With nearly a quarter of British children already obese or overweight by the time they start primary school, this observational documentary series plans to follow seven obese children for the next decade, revisiting them regularly to discover what it's like to grow up as an obese child in Britain today.

The Hospital (w/t) reveals the impact on the NHS of teenagers hitting the health self-destruct button. Filmed in hospitals across the Midlands, three films take the temperature of the NHS today through portraits of the teams treating young patients for a range of self-inflicted health problems and conditions. As the unemployment rate rises in the UK, The Benefit Business (w/t) is a timely examination of modern Britain's complex relationship with work. The series follows the implementation of radical welfare reforms - from the desk of the Secretary of State to the counter at Job Centre Plus. 

Revelations is a new documentary strand exploring the impact religion has on the lives of believers and non-believers in Britain. Films in the strand include: Commando Vicars, which gains exclusive access to the chaplains serving alongside the troops in Afghanistan; The Alpha Course (w/t), in which Jon Ronson joins a group of strangers on the course that aims to convert non-believers into committed Christians; Muslim School, which goes inside one of Britain's 120 Muslim faith schools; and The Exhumer, a documentary portrait of Peter Mitchell, who makes his living digging up bodies.

This summer Alan Carr hosts a brand new entertainment chat show. In a brand new comedy quiz, You Have Been Watching, Charlie Brooker offers his unique interpretation of the curious, wonderful and often inglorious world of television.

Drama on 4 includes Endgame, a feature-length political thriller starring William Hurt, inspired by the secret talks between Afrikaners and ANC exiles that took place in the late 1980s in the unlikely setting of an English country house. From the creators of The Wire comes critically-acclaimed US series Generation Kill, and George Clooney makes his much-heralded guest appearance in the 15th and final season of ER.

In the television premiere of award-winning Hunger, Turner Prize-winning artist Steve McQueen directs an account of the IRA hunger strike and its leader Bobby Sands.

Factual highlights include David Starkey's Henry VIII: The Mind of a Tyrant, which marks the 500th anniversary of his accession. 1066: The Battle for Middle Earth re-imagines the story of the Norman Conquest through the eyes of the ordinary men who fought for the land. Kwame Kwei-Armah retraces the Queen's remarkable 1953 world tour in On Tour with The Queen (w/t). In Rupert Everett in Search of Lord Byron, the actor follows in Byron's footsteps to try and understand the man whose good looks, maverick sex life and writing talent made him Britain's first modern celebrity. The World's Greatest Musical Prodigies profiles a prolific young composer attempting to bring together the world's most talented young musicians to perform a concerto.

The latest run of Cutting Edge, Channel 4's flagship documentary strand, includes: Red Lion, a snapshot of Britain as a nation of drinkers from the perspective of punters at pubs that share the most common pub name in the UK; and Murder Mansion, which explores what drove Christopher Foster to commit suicide, double murder and arson at his Shropshire mansion.

Sir Gerry Robinson comes to the rescue of businesses on the verge of bankruptcy, armed with his personal cheque book, in Gerry's Big Decision. Over four consecutive nights Anna Richardson examines how pornography is affecting young people in Sex Education vs Pornography.

Gordon Ramsay embarks on a gastronomic tour of India in Gordon's Great Escape. On the ‘home front' Kirstie Allsop transforms a dilapidated cottage using local craft and careful restoration in Kirstie's Homemade Home. Sarah Beeny takes a definitive look at how property developing has endured the housing market meltdown in Property Snakes & Ladders.

Daredevils depicts some of the world's most extreme individuals as they push themselves to their mental and physical limits to fulfil personal dreams. Extreme Male Beauty explores the lengths that some men go to in pursuit of physical perfection. And summer would not be summer without Big Brother which returns for its tenth series.

British Comedy Award winner, The Inbetweeners, returns to E4 with its painfully brilliant take on growing up in middle class suburbia. More4's international documentary strand True Stories showcases more feature-length films from around the world, including Afghan Star, which portrays four contestants competing in a Pop Idol-style TV series in Afghanistan. New drama on More4 includes Saving Grace starring Holly Hunter.

Education highlights include The Ministry, a web game for 14 to 16-year-olds that is designed to explore issues around online identity, privacy and surveillance.

Channel 4 continues to offer viewers a different perspective on the world with a range of distinctive and compelling new programmes for spring and summer.

Building on successful recent seasons such as Disarming Britain and Can't Read Can't Write, Channel 4 will put the care system under the spotlight in Britain's Forgotten Children, asking why a quarter of the 4,000 children up for adoption each year can't find a family.

The centrepiece of the season, Adopt Me, follows four households of would-be adopters as they take part in a pioneering project to try and find homes for the children no one else wants. The season also features The Unloved, a single drama about a young girl growing up in a children's home, directed by Oscar-nominated actress Samantha Morton. In a film for the Cutting Edge strand, The Homecoming, journalist Rachel Roberts explores the repercussions for children of being in care, while Rageh Omaar will also be reporting on the subject in a special edition of Dispatches.

Having screened the first televised human autopsy in 2002, Channel 4 now turns its attention to the animal kingdom for another TV first. Animal Autopsy (w/t) shows the dissection of a selection of extraordinary creatures - an elephant, a giraffe, a crocodile and a whale. Made in co-operation with the Royal Veterinary College and presented by vet Mark Evans, each dissection will be handled by an expert in the species, while biologist Richard Dawkins explains what the animals' different anatomies reveal about evolution.

A clutch of state-of-the-nation documentary series pepper Channel 4's forthcoming schedule, including Generation XXL (w/t), which examines the obesity epidemic overtaking Britain's children. With nearly a quarter of British children already obese or overweight by the time they start primary school, this observational documentary series plans to follow seven obese children for the next decade, revisiting them regularly to discover what it's like to grow up as an obese child in Britain today.

The Hospital (w/t) reveals the impact on the NHS of teenagers hitting the health self-destruct button. Filmed in hospitals across the Midlands, three films take the temperature of the NHS today through portraits of the teams treating young patients for a range of self-inflicted health problems and conditions. As the unemployment rate rises in the UK, The Benefit Business (w/t) is a timely examination of modern Britain's complex relationship with work. The series follows the implementation of radical welfare reforms - from the desk of the Secretary of State to the counter at Job Centre Plus. 

Revelations is a new documentary strand exploring the impact religion has on the lives of believers and non-believers in Britain. Films in the strand include: Commando Vicars, which gains exclusive access to the chaplains serving alongside the troops in Afghanistan; The Alpha Course (w/t), in which Jon Ronson joins a group of strangers on the course that aims to convert non-believers into committed Christians; Muslim School, which goes inside one of Britain's 120 Muslim faith schools; and The Exhumer, a documentary portrait of Peter Mitchell, who makes his living digging up bodies.

This summer Alan Carr hosts a brand new entertainment chat show. In a brand new comedy quiz, You Have Been Watching, Charlie Brooker offers his unique interpretation of the curious, wonderful and often inglorious world of television.

Drama on 4 includes Endgame, a feature-length political thriller starring William Hurt, inspired by the secret talks between Afrikaners and ANC exiles that took place in the late 1980s in the unlikely setting of an English country house. From the creators of The Wire comes critically-acclaimed US series Generation Kill, and George Clooney makes his much-heralded guest appearance in the 15th and final season of ER.

In the television premiere of award-winning Hunger, Turner Prize-winning artist Steve McQueen directs an account of the IRA hunger strike and its leader Bobby Sands.

Factual highlights include David Starkey's Henry VIII: The Mind of a Tyrant, which marks the 500th anniversary of his accession. 1066: The Battle for Middle Earth re-imagines the story of the Norman Conquest through the eyes of the ordinary men who fought for the land. Kwame Kwei-Armah retraces the Queen's remarkable 1953 world tour in On Tour with The Queen (w/t). In Rupert Everett in Search of Lord Byron, the actor follows in Byron's footsteps to try and understand the man whose good looks, maverick sex life and writing talent made him Britain's first modern celebrity. The World's Greatest Musical Prodigies profiles a prolific young composer attempting to bring together the world's most talented young musicians to perform a concerto.

The latest run of Cutting Edge, Channel 4's flagship documentary strand, includes: Red Lion, a snapshot of Britain as a nation of drinkers from the perspective of punters at pubs that share the most common pub name in the UK; and Murder Mansion, which explores what drove Christopher Foster to commit suicide, double murder and arson at his Shropshire mansion.

Sir Gerry Robinson comes to the rescue of businesses on the verge of bankruptcy, armed with his personal cheque book, in Gerry's Big Decision. Over four consecutive nights Anna Richardson examines how pornography is affecting young people in Sex Education vs Pornography.

Gordon Ramsay embarks on a gastronomic tour of India in Gordon's Great Escape. On the ‘home front' Kirstie Allsop transforms a dilapidated cottage using local craft and careful restoration in Kirstie's Homemade Home. Sarah Beeny takes a definitive look at how property developing has endured the housing market meltdown in Property Snakes & Ladders.

Daredevils depicts some of the world's most extreme individuals as they push themselves to their mental and physical limits to fulfil personal dreams. Extreme Male Beauty explores the lengths that some men go to in pursuit of physical perfection. And summer would not be summer without Big Brother which returns for its tenth series.

British Comedy Award winner, The Inbetweeners, returns to E4 with its painfully brilliant take on growing up in middle class suburbia. More4's international documentary strand True Stories showcases more feature-length films from around the world, including Afghan Star, which portrays four contestants competing in a Pop Idol-style TV series in Afghanistan. New drama on More4 includes Saving Grace starring Holly Hunter.

Education highlights include The Ministry, a web game for 14 to 16-year-olds that is designed to explore issues around online identity, privacy and surveillance.

Channel 4 continues to offer viewers a different perspective on the world with a range of distinctive and compelling new programmes for spring and summer.

Building on successful recent seasons such as Disarming Britain and Can't Read Can't Write, Channel 4 will put the care system under the spotlight in Britain's Forgotten Children, asking why a quarter of the 4,000 children up for adoption each year can't find a family.

The centrepiece of the season, Adopt Me, follows four households of would-be adopters as they take part in a pioneering project to try and find homes for the children no one else wants. The season also features The Unloved, a single drama about a young girl growing up in a children's home, directed by Oscar-nominated actress Samantha Morton. In a film for the Cutting Edge strand, The Homecoming, journalist Rachel Roberts explores the repercussions for children of being in care, while Rageh Omaar will also be reporting on the subject in a special edition of Dispatches.

Having screened the first televised human autopsy in 2002, Channel 4 now turns its attention to the animal kingdom for another TV first. Animal Autopsy (w/t) shows the dissection of a selection of extraordinary creatures - an elephant, a giraffe, a crocodile and a whale. Made in co-operation with the Royal Veterinary College and presented by vet Mark Evans, each dissection will be handled by an expert in the species, while biologist Richard Dawkins explains what the animals' different anatomies reveal about evolution.

A clutch of state-of-the-nation documentary series pepper Channel 4's forthcoming schedule, including Generation XXL (w/t), which examines the obesity epidemic overtaking Britain's children. With nearly a quarter of British children already obese or overweight by the time they start primary school, this observational documentary series plans to follow seven obese children for the next decade, revisiting them regularly to discover what it's like to grow up as an obese child in Britain today.

The Hospital (w/t) reveals the impact on the NHS of teenagers hitting the health self-destruct button. Filmed in hospitals across the Midlands, three films take the temperature of the NHS today through portraits of the teams treating young patients for a range of self-inflicted health problems and conditions. As the unemployment rate rises in the UK, The Benefit Business (w/t) is a timely examination of modern Britain's complex relationship with work. The series follows the implementation of radical welfare reforms - from the desk of the Secretary of State to the counter at Job Centre Plus. 

Revelations is a new documentary strand exploring the impact religion has on the lives of believers and non-believers in Britain. Films in the strand include: Commando Vicars, which gains exclusive access to the chaplains serving alongside the troops in Afghanistan; The Alpha Course (w/t), in which Jon Ronson joins a group of strangers on the course that aims to convert non-believers into committed Christians; Muslim School, which goes inside one of Britain's 120 Muslim faith schools; and The Exhumer, a documentary portrait of Peter Mitchell, who makes his living digging up bodies.

This summer Alan Carr hosts a brand new entertainment chat show. In a brand new comedy quiz, You Have Been Watching, Charlie Brooker offers his unique interpretation of the curious, wonderful and often inglorious world of television.

Drama on 4 includes Endgame, a feature-length political thriller starring William Hurt, inspired by the secret talks between Afrikaners and ANC exiles that took place in the late 1980s in the unlikely setting of an English country house. From the creators of The Wire comes critically-acclaimed US series Generation Kill, and George Clooney makes his much-heralded guest appearance in the 15th and final season of ER.

In the television premiere of award-winning Hunger, Turner Prize-winning artist Steve McQueen directs an account of the IRA hunger strike and its leader Bobby Sands.

Factual highlights include David Starkey's Henry VIII: The Mind of a Tyrant, which marks the 500th anniversary of his accession. 1066: The Battle for Middle Earth re-imagines the story of the Norman Conquest through the eyes of the ordinary men who fought for the land. Kwame Kwei-Armah retraces the Queen's remarkable 1953 world tour in On Tour with The Queen (w/t). In Rupert Everett in Search of Lord Byron, the actor follows in Byron's footsteps to try and understand the man whose good looks, maverick sex life and writing talent made him Britain's first modern celebrity. The World's Greatest Musical Prodigies profiles a prolific young composer attempting to bring together the world's most talented young musicians to perform a concerto.

The latest run of Cutting Edge, Channel 4's flagship documentary strand, includes: Red Lion, a snapshot of Britain as a nation of drinkers from the perspective of punters at pubs that share the most common pub name in the UK; and Murder Mansion, which explores what drove Christopher Foster to commit suicide, double murder and arson at his Shropshire mansion.

Sir Gerry Robinson comes to the rescue of businesses on the verge of bankruptcy, armed with his personal cheque book, in Gerry's Big Decision. Over four consecutive nights Anna Richardson examines how pornography is affecting young people in Sex Education vs Pornography.

Gordon Ramsay embarks on a gastronomic tour of India in Gordon's Great Escape. On the ‘home front' Kirstie Allsop transforms a dilapidated cottage using local craft and careful restoration in Kirstie's Homemade Home. Sarah Beeny takes a definitive look at how property developing has endured the housing market meltdown in Property Snakes & Ladders.

Daredevils depicts some of the world's most extreme individuals as they push themselves to their mental and physical limits to fulfil personal dreams. Extreme Male Beauty explores the lengths that some men go to in pursuit of physical perfection. And summer would not be summer without Big Brother which returns for its tenth series.

British Comedy Award winner, The Inbetweeners, returns to E4 with its painfully brilliant take on growing up in middle class suburbia. More4's international documentary strand True Stories showcases more feature-length films from around the world, including Afghan Star, which portrays four contestants competing in a Pop Idol-style TV series in Afghanistan. New drama on More4 includes Saving Grace starring Holly Hunter.

Education highlights include The Ministry, a web game for 14 to 16-year-olds that is designed to explore issues around online identity, privacy and surveillance.