It's one of the darkest murder mysteries in British history: did Richard III really kill his nephews in order to make himself king? Is he the greatest villain in English history, or the victim of centuries of grotesquely unfair Tudor propaganda? On the eve of Richard's reburial at Leicester Cathedral - which will be covered exclusively by Channel 4, starting tomorrow - this drama documentary assembles a stellar cast of experts, including David Starkey and Philippa Gregory, to examine all the available evidence. As it plays out the possibilities and tests the competing theories, it endeavours to get to the bottom, once and for all, of what really happened to the princes in the Tower. Is this a tale of naked ambition, cold pragmatism and bloody murder?
Richard III - the king found under a council car park in Leicester in 2012 - will be buried in the city's cathedral. Channel 4 is broadcasting live and exclusively from Leicester in a special programme presented by Jon Snow with Krishnan Guru-Murthy, Arthur Williams and Sonali Shah. This first part captures the climax of the procession of the king's mortal remains to the site of his death at Bosworth Battlefield, through the streets of Leicester and to the service that marks his reception into Leicester Cathedral, with a sermon given by the Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Vincent Nichols. Channel 4 assembles leading historians, actors and politicians descendants of the king and key participants in his rediscovery, to ask who Richard really was and what his place in British history should now be. Then Channel 4 returns to Leicester Cathedral for exclusive live coverage of the reburial.
William Shakespeare's classic play is brought into the present with the setting as Great Britian in the 1930s.