Skip to main content

Blair: The Inside Story

Tony Blair is already the longest serving Labour prime minister in our history, as he approaches his 10th anniversary in Number 10 this May and nears the end of his premiership.

Michael Cockerell says: "The last 10 years have been a compelling political psycho-drama. From being the most popular prime minister in our history, Tony Blair has become one of the least popular.

"In this series, I'll be looking at why that has happened and at the interplay between power and the prime minister's complex, multi-layered personality."

Candid interviews with Downing Street insiders, cabinet colleagues and rivals give a fresh perspective on the key events of the past tumultuous decade.

The series also draws on Cockerell's own extensive filming of Tony Blair inside Number 10 (some never seen before) and reveals the sharp contrast between the new leader, the war leader and the leader who knew his days were numbered.

Programme 1: The New Leader - Tuesday 20 February
The first programme examines how Tony Blair came to power on a huge wave of public goodwill, as the Tories were swept out of office on a tide of sleaze and incompetence.

With a blazing sense of mission, the new prime minister promised his government would be whiter than white, and that he would transform Britain and make the world a better place.

Those who have been closest to Blair reveal in the programme how he responded to the many challenges and crises that face a modern prime minister, and how his early years in office taught him a number of painful lessons about the gap between spin and substance.



Programme 2: A Man With A Mission - Tuesday 27 February
The second programme tells the inside story of Tony Blair's wars.

Blair's decision to go to war in Iraq provoked mass protests in the UK
It includes a remarkable speech that Blair made in his first month as prime minister, proclaiming his could be the first generation where not a single British soldier was sent to war.

Yet in his first six years at Number 10, Blair ordered British troops into battle a record number of five times. Michael Cockerell reveals the reasons why.

He shows how the prime minister developed his radical new doctrine of the moral case for intervening by force against evil across the whole world.

Interviews with the people closest to Blair cast new light on his burning sense of personal mission. And key Downing Street insiders talk for the first time about the effect of Blair's Christian beliefs on his policy.

The programme also shows how the prime minister was able to transfer his allegiance from President Clinton - whom he had strongly supported throughout the Monica Lewinski affair - to the Neo-Conservative George W Bush.

And how it was that Blair gave his unstinting support to Bush for the invasion of Iraq, which has done such damage to the prime minister's reputation.


Programme 3: The End Of The Affair - Tuesday 6 March
The final part of Michael Cockerell's acclaimed series tells the story of Tony Blair's final years in office.

Blair's decade-long relationship with the British people has been a bitter-sweet affair
Michael Cockerell
It is a period dominated by a range of crises: Blair's heart problems, his troubles with Gordon Brown, the aftermath of the war in Iraq, the plots to overthrow him, cash for honours allegations and endless questions about when he would leave Number 10.

Cockerell explains: "Tony Blair's time at the top has been a compelling political psycho-drama. His decade-long relationship with the British people has been a bitter-sweet affair.(Excerpts from bbc)



"And as it comes to an end, our programme will be attempting a first assessment of the Blair legacy and his place in history."

Popular posts from this blog

Danny Ray Horning - The Butcher

Danny Ray Horning robs a Winslow, Arizona bank, and is linked to a gruesome murder that took place months before. But the dangerous criminal manages to walk out of a prison in broad daylight, setting off a massive manhunt with the FBI

Positively Naked

This 2005 HBO documentary shows behind the scenes at a Spencer Tunick art installation of 85 HIV-positive people posing naked at Florent Restaurant for the 10th anniversary cover of POZ Magazine. Featuring: Vinny Allegrini, Gwen Barringer, Shawn Decker, Mark de Solla Price, Elizabeth Perez, Barbara Kemper Powell, Ron Singleton, Sean Strub, Spence Sutton, Julia Tripp, and Spencer Tunick (photographer).

Dark Side of Porn - Debbie Does Dallas Uncovered 18+

Also known as The Curse of Debbie Does Dallas, in the vein of Inside Deep Throat, it examines the history of the production and marketing of the 1978 cult hit, Debbie Does Dallas, and is a study of the porn industry in the 1970s. Interviews with former porn stars also try to uncover the mystery of Bambi Woods, the starlet who disappeared from porn soon after Debbie Does Dallas and was rumored to have connections with the mafia and problems with the FBI. Featuring interviews with Robin Byrd, female actress in the movie and Bill Kelly, a former FBI agent once working on an undercover operation to bust porn producers.