Media

Television work has included appearances on BBC One’s When the Queen Spoke to the Nation (broadcast in September 2022 as part of the tributes to the late Queen Elizabeth II), BBC One’s Empire presented by Jeremy Paxman (2011), BBC Two’s Cunk on Britain (2018) and Cunk on Earth (2022), BBC One’s Heir Hunters (2014), BBC One’s Cue the Queen: Celebrating the Christmas Speech, presented by Kirsty Young (2015), BBC Four’s Masterpieces of the East (2008), BBC Four’s A Timewatch Guide: The British Empire, Heroes and Villains presented by David Olusoga (2017), Channel Four’s The Royal House of Windsor (2017), the twelve-part Discovery series World War II: Witness to War (2017), Foxtel History Channel’s Turning Points episode on Winston Churchill (2018), and BBC Culture’s review of the film Darkest Hour (2018).

Radio appearances have included BBC Radio 3’s Night Waves (2009), BBC Radio Berkshire’s Mike Reed Show (2014), ARD German Radio (2014), BBC World Service’s Delivering the King’s Speech, presented by Louise Minchin (2014), and BBC World Service/National Public Radio’s review of the film Darkest Hour (2018). On Remembrance Sunday 2019, I did back-to-back live interviews on the South Asian contribution to the world wars on BBC Radio Manchester, BBC Radio Luton, BBC Radio Sheffield, BBC Radio Stoke, and BBC Radio West Midlands.

I’ve been consulted by media outfits such as the Daily Mail, the Daily Telegraph, the Independent, the Observer, the Sunday Times, the Sunday Express, the Washington Post, BBC World Service, Sky Digital, and BBC Online, and programmes such as BBC Radio Four’s The Today Programme, BBC Two’s Newsnight, BBC One’s The One Show and Who Do You Think You Are?, and, in the USA, the PBS series Finding Your Roots. Topics have included the Royal Navy and the slave trade, the Royal Family’s 1939 tour of North America, the teaching of imperial history in schools, skin whitening, Winston Churchill, Cecil Rhodes, H. M. Stanley, US servicemen in Iran during the Second World War, colonial contributions to the Second World War, and whether British museums should repatriate ‘difficult collections’ to their countries of origin.

I was historical consultant for BBC Two’s Burma, My Father, and the Forgotten Army presented by Griff Rhys Jones (2013) and for the BBC Two series Black and British: A Forgotten History (2016). I advised the Kenneth Branagh Theatre Company on the Suez Crisis when it staged John Osborne’s The Entertainer at the Garrick Theatre (2016), starring Sir Kenneth Branagh, Greta Scacchi, and Sophie McShera, and penned the programme notes on the crisis. In 2017 I advised the company producing and performing Enua Ellams’ Barber Shop Chronicles at The National Theatre.