Union with David Olusoga

David Olusoga is back on the box – and that can only be a good thing.

While watching his informative yet entertaining programmes, we tend to feel a little more intelligent; he manages to enlighten his viewers without browbeating them. If only he’d been in charge of our school history lessons…

If you’re wondering why a large number of his projects crop up on the BBC, it’s because they know a good thing when they see it – in 2021, the broadcaster signed a deal giving them a first look at everything made by Uplands TV, the production company set up by Olusoga and Mike Smith in 2017.

“Our ambition in founding Uplands TV was to create television that brought a diverse range of factual stories and history to life which would appeal to a range of audiences in Britain and across the world,” say the duo.

“Mike and David create television that is both accessible to watch and thought-provoking,” adds Mark Linsey, BBC Studios’ Chief Creative Officer. “They are experts in story-telling, using their background in history and programme-making to engage and enlighten audiences, even on difficult subject matters. This makes their work fresh, unique and inclusive.”

Olusoga is, of course, best known for presenting the series A House Through Time, in which he explores history via the people who have lived in a particular property. He’s also hosted such shows as Britain’s Forgotten Slave Owners, The Unwanted: The Secret Windrush Files and Our NHS: A Hidden History.

Their success and importance in bringing to light largely uncovered stories led to him receiving a Bafta Special Award earlier this year. In his acceptance speech, he was keen to point out the huge part TV had played in his life.

He said: “I owe television so much… It was watching history documentaries as a teenager that made me decide to study history. It was watching David Attenborough reveal the natural world that made me get on a plane with a backpack in my 20s and 30s.”

He then added: “If I have a hope, it is that people entering the industry today, people from backgrounds like mine, minority communities, people from council estates, that they might perhaps find their journey through the industry a little easier.”

Now Olusoga believes his personal background – after relocating to his mother’s native north east from Nigeria at the age of five, he grew up within a working-class community, seeing first hand social divisions while experiencing terrifying racist attacks – gives him a perhaps unique insight into the subject of his latest series, a five-part documentary examining the fractures within the United Kingdom, as well as what has kept it together, so far.

“I’m seeking to bring a timely understanding of the history that lies behind the fault lines of contemporary Britain,” he explains.

No doubt he’ll be successful in his quest, and after tuning in, we’ll all feel rather more enlightened – and who knows, he may even inspire a TV historian of the future in the process.