- Title: The Badness Of King George Iv
- Date: 28th February 2004
- Summary: His style and taste defined the Regency period, but as Prince Regent and as King, George IV's extravagance and self-indulgence attracted ridicule, derision and hatred. On the day of his funeral in 1830 The Times of London wrote: "There never was an individual less regretted by his fellow creatures than this deceased King... of all known beings the most selfish... Nothing remains to be said about George IV but to pay, as pay we must, for his profusion." The Badness of King George IV uses an imaginative blend of drama and documentary to tell the story of Britain's most unpopular and out of touch monarch. Based on contemporary sources, the programme pictures a dying, drug-addled King as he relives the key events from his colourful life and is haunted by the words of his critics. Oliver Ford Davies plays the part of George and Robert Glenister plays the 'Hellhound' (George's word for his critics) who torments him with his failings. King George IV considered himself the "First Gentleman of Europe," Napoleon's equal, engaged in a mighty struggle to protect Europe from the French emperor. Although as a young man he was handsome, multi-lingual, musically accomplished and witty, as he grew older his high self-opinion became less and less justified. The Regency Period was a time of great freedom and reform, and laid the foundations for the industrial revolution, but there is no evidence to suggest that George had anything to do with any such advances. Rather, he spent most of the period in the Brighton Pavilion, the extravagant pleasure palace he commissioned and increasingly grew to resemble: colourful, over-indulgent, expensive and irrelevant. George's profligacy was in stark contrast to his upbringing. He had grown up in the "Palace of Piety": the dull court of his father, King George III, who valued virtue in monarchs to the extent that he had George and his brothers grow their own vegetables. But his father's influence did not have the desired effect: George became a gambler and extravagant spendthrift who revelled in mixing with 'colourful' members of society. By the tender age of 22, he was massively in debt and had to repeatedly petition Parliament for new funds - not a popular move. George used George III's well-documented mental problems to his advantage, scheming with his father's political rivals in an attempt to be installed as Prince Regent. His plans failed and, when his father's health improved, family relations were strained. George III did grant his son a ceremonial position in the Napoleonic Wars, but George blew it out of all proportion, claiming he was Napoleon's great rival and that he fought alongside Wellington, who George hero-worshipped. It was not a sentiment that Wellington returned. George's greatest rival was not in fact Napoleon, but his own wife. After making a secret and illegal marriage to his catholic lover, Maria Fitzherbert he was forced to take his father's choice of official bride, Caroline of Brunswick, in return for the writing off of considerable debts. But he was not keen on his bride, who "talked incessantly." The press slated him for his treatment of her, and very soon they were living apart. George eventually became Prince Regent in 1810, long after he had planned, and became King following his father's death ten years later. Caroline, who had been living abroad with an Italian gentleman, returned to take her place at the coronation, but was turned away. And George's health had already started its inexorable decline...
- Description:The Real Prince Regent The Badness of King George IV uses a blend of drama and documentary to tell the story of Britain's most unpopular and out of touch monarch. Based on contemporary sources,the programme pictures a dying,drug-addled King as he relives the key events from his colourful life and is haunted by the words of his critics. Cast: Oliver Ford Davies (King George IV),Robert Glenister (The Hellhound/ Wellington),Geoffrey Bateman (King George III),Laura Macaulay (Caroline of Brunswick),Frances Ward (Lady Conyngham),Jamie Coates (Young Prince George),Alexander Philips (Young Prince Frederick),Catherine Lewendon (Italian Chambermaid),Tim Ball (Dr. Henry Halford) Director: Tim Kirby
- Broadcaster:Channel 4
- Collection: Channel 4
- Genre:Documentary and Factual
- Producer:Flashback Television Ltd.
- Programme Episode:Episode 1
- Transmission Date:28/02/2004
- Rights:Worldwide
- Decade: 2000s