King Charles Set To Tell His Own Journey To The Throne In New BBC Special
King Charles will be telling his own life story in a new BBC special set to be released ahead of his coronation next month.
The special 60-minute documentary, called Charles R: The Making of a Monarch, is set to air on BBC One and BBC iPlayer on Sunday, April 30, less than a week before the May 6 coronation.
According to the BBC, the programme will offer “audiences a chance to witness unseen and rarely seen footage of King Charles III, telling his more than 70-year story as heir to the throne, through his own words” over the decades.
The BBC describes the documentary as “the story of how a Prince became a King” and an “unfiltered and immersive portrait of our new monarch”.
Charles is set to discuss his own childhood, his memories of the Queen’s coronation (he was only four at the time), his school years and his investiture as Prince of Wales.
Charles became the heir apparent when his mother unexpectedly inherited the throne in 1952, following the sudden death of King George VI.
He eventually became Britain’s longest-serving heir, waiting in line for more than seven decades until he himself inherited the throne back in September.
The documentary, made by BBC Studios who also produced 2022′s programme, Elizabeth: The Unseen Queen, includes clips from the 1969 documentary Royal Family.
That footage has been under lock and key in the BFI National Archive since 1977, after it was widely criticised for destroying the mystique around the Firm (including by David Attenborough).
On Tuesday evening, the BBC released five never before seen stills from the programme showing Charles as the Prince of Wales flying a plane solo, visiting the Royal Mint with his mother, travelling to Malta when he was young and decorating a Christmas tree at Windsor.
BBC Studios were also granted access to clips from the Royal Family’s private home movie footage showing how Charles’ fondness for nature began.
The BBC’s Head of History, Simon Young, said: “It’s a real privilege to be trusted with such rare, unseen archive material to create a new and distinctive portrait of someone so famous and photographed.”
Charles R: The Making of a Monarch airs Sunday, April 30 at 8pm on BBC One.