Walter Murch picks Mohammad Mossadegh, prime minister following the nationalisation of the Anglo-Iranian oil company in 1951. Mossadegh was ousted in a coup in 1953.
Murch became fascinated in Mossadegh's life while working on a Sam Mendes film about the first Iraq War. Walter Murch is an editor best known for Apocalypse Now, The Godfather and The Constant Gardener. He also worked on a documentary called Coup 53. This is the first in a new series of Great Lives and includes archive of Kermit Roosevelt, a CIA operative. The British were also heavily involved in the coup. The expert is Professor Ali Ansari of St Andrews University, presenter on Radio 4 of Through Persian Eyes.
The producer in Bristol is Miles Warde
Future programme subjects include singer Eartha Kitt, author JG Ballard, and pioneering British aviator Diana Barnato-Walker who delivered Spitfires in World War Two.
Tom Allen on Kenneth Williams
Ernie Bevin, forgotten political giant
Jessie Ware on Donna Summer
Peter Frankopan on Konstantin Tsiolkovsky
Frida Kahlo nominated by author Jessie Burton
Mussolini
Dolly Alderton on Doris Day
Sybille Bedford, author of Jigsaw and A Legacy
Billy Bremner of Leeds United
Sally Phillips on Hollywood star Myrna Loy
Victoria Wood
Maya Angelou
Ursula Le Guin nominated by Kate Stables
Frank Cottrell Boyce on Tove Jansson
Rick Stein on Jim Morrison
Andi Oliver on Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison
Kurt Vonnegut
Charlie Parker nominated by Ken Clarke
Bill Bailey on his hero Alfred Russel Wallace
Novelist Enid Blyton
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