THE THREE MUSKETEERS OF FORMULA 1 ON BBC FOUR: JIM CLARK, GRAHAM HILL AND JACKIE STEWART


Three documentaries produced by Mark Stewart Productions, ‘Jim Clark: The Quiet Champion’, ‘Graham Hill: Driven’ and ‘Jackie Stewart: The Flying Scot’, will be shown on BBC Four over the 2009 Easter weekend.


These motor-racing musketeers won seven Formula 1 world championships between 1962 and 1973: two each for Clark and Hill and three for Stewart. At a time when ‘sex was safe and motor-racing was dangerous’, the young drivers were rivals and yet close friends, their stories often intertwined; but, as these intimate films clearly demonstrate, these were distinctive individuals whose lives unfolded in very different ways.





1 x 59-minutes


Currently scheduled - but not confirmed - for:

7.00pm, 18th April 2009 on BBC Four **(Changed from Easter Monday 13th April)**


An intimate portrait of Jim Clark, one of the most talented yet enigmatic sporting figures that Britain has ever produced. Combining rare archive film with the memories of family, friends and rivals, the film provides a moving portrait of a motor-racing genius, tragically killed at height of his career.


At the heart of the film are family home-movies of Clark’s life in the Scottish Borders; and an exclusive hoard of ‘lost tapes’ – candid interviews with Clark conducted by his close friend Graham Gauld during the mid-1960s - that show the shy driver in a surprising new light.  


Apart from the rare experience of hearing Clark explain himself in his own voice, the film also offers frank comments from his friends. Jackie Stewart, for example, remembers a string of races where he finished second to his unbeatable fellow Scot: “We became known as Batman & Robin; and there was no doubt which was Batman and which was Robin.”





For executive producer Mark Stewart (younger son of Jackie), making this documentary has been a poignant journey: “In late 1967 my parents asked Jim to be my godfather. For reasons we explore in the film he never made it to the christening - but, forty years on and working with my friend Mark Craig who directed this film, I feel as if I’ve finally got to know the Jim Clark I never met.”


To view a short trailer of the documentary go to:








1 x 89-minutes


Currently scheduled - but not confirmed - for:

7.00pm, Easter Sunday 12 April 2009 on BBC Four


Sir Jackie Stewart - winner of three F1 World Championships and twenty-seven Grand Prix – will turn 70 this coming June 2009. Forty years ago, with his black cap and sideburns and the 1969 World Championship under his belt, Stewart became an unmistakable icon of the sixties.


Friend and rival Emerson Fittipaldi remembers the period when ‘Planet of the Apes’-style hair was de rigueur: “It was a fashion in the sixties, the type of hair, the sideburns. I said, ‘Why not? …Jackie has sideburns and he’s going fast, I have to have bigger ones to go even faster than him!’”


Beyond the world of motor sport, The Flying Scot is above all a compelling human story - and a comprehensive insight into the triumphs and tragedies of an eventful life.  Stewart’s driving career ended in 1973, at his ninety-ninth Grand Prix, where he won his third World Championship – and lost his friend and team-mate Francois Cevert. The film goes on to describe Stewart’s subsequent rise as an internationally respected businessman and successes with Stewart Grand Prix, his own F1 team.


The Flying Scot film includes contributions from many friends and colleagues including Niki Lauda, Emerson Fittipaldi, Sean Connery, Murray Walker and Edsel Ford, as well as the last ever interview from the late, Ken Tyrrell without whom Stewart’s career might have taken a very different turn.


Produced by Stewart’s younger son Mark and award-winning director Mark Craig, the film is enriched with family photographs, home movies and scrapbooks kept by Lady Helen Stewart, documenting her husband’s career.


 To view a short trailer of the documentary go to:

 




1 x 59-minutes  


Currently scheduled - but not confirmed - for:

7.00pm, Saturday 11 April 2009 on BBC Four


Mark Stewart Productions’ film presents the compelling story of Graham Hill, an eccentric and charismatic Englishman from a forgotten era

 of motor sport.  


To this day Hill is the only driver to have won the 'triple crown' of motor racing: the Formula 1 World Championship (twice), the Indianapolis 500 and the Le Mans 24-hours race. He also won the uniquely challenging Monaco Grand Prix five times - and this at a time when drivers routinely met with violent death.  


Away from the circuit the film reveals that Hill was an accomplished raconteur, a dashing figure with a keen eye for the ladies. In the tradition of Terry-Thomas and Leslie Phillips, his public persona was that of the quintessential English cad - with a dash of Dick Dastardly.


As described by his friends and family, including his World Champion son Damon, Hill was an irrepressible free spirit who simply didn't know when to quit. Ultimately, this was to be his undoing…


To view a short trailer of the documentary go to: