Pericles, Prince of Tyre

England, 15th century. Hal, a capricious prince who lives among the populace far from court, is forced by circumstances to reluctantly accept the throne and become Henry V.

Gritty adaption of William Shakespeare's play about the English King's bloody conquest of France.

A Scottish warlord and his wife murder their way to a pair of crowns.

In the midst of the Hundred Years' War, the young King Henry V of England embarks on the conquest of France in 1415.

Prospero, a potent magician, lives on a desolate isle with his virginal daughter, Miranda. He's in exile, banished from his duchy by his usurping brother and the King of Naples. Providence brings these enemies near; aided by his vassal the spirit Ariel, Prospero conjures a tempest to wreck the Italian ship. The king's son, thinking all others lost, becomes Prospero's prisoner, falling in love with Miranda and she with him. Prospero's brother and the king wander the island, as do a drunken cook and sailor, who conspire with Caliban, Prospero's beastly slave, to murder Prospero. Prospero wants reason to triumph, Ariel wants his freedom, Miranda a husband; the sailors want to dance.

King Lear, old and tired, divides his kingdom among his daughters, giving great importance to their protestations of love for him. When Cordelia, youngest and most honest, refuses to idly flatter the old man in return for favor, he banishes her and turns for support to his remaining daughters. But Goneril and Regan have no love for him and instead plot to take all his power from him. In a parallel, Lear's loyal courtier Gloucester favors his illegitimate son Edmund after being told lies about his faithful son Edgar. Madness and tragedy befall both ill-starred fathers.

Tony Richardson's Hamlet is based on his own stage production. Filmed entirely within the Roundhouse in London (a disused train shed), it is shot almost entirely in close up, focusing the attention on faces and language rather than action.

In eleventh century Scotland, three witches foretell that Macbeth will become King, while Banquo will beget Kings. Macbeth accordingly has King Duncan slain, and is duly crowned in his place. But that's where his problems really begin...

An aging King invites disaster when he abdicates to his corrupt, toadying daughters and rejects his one loving, but honest one.

Macbeth and his wife murder Duncan in order to gain his crown, but the bloodbath doesn't stop there, and things supernatural combine to bring the Macbeths down.

Timon loves to give parties and objects to friends, but when he cannot pay his creditors, his "friends" refuse to help him, and he becomes a misanthropic hermit.

King Lear, old and tired, divides his kingdom among his daughters, giving great importance to their protestations of love for him. When Cordelia, youngest and most honest, refuses to idly flatter the old man in return for favor, he banishes her and turns for support to his remaining daughters. But Goneril and Regan have no love for him and instead plot to take all his power from him. In a parallel, Lear's loyal courtier Gloucester favors his illegitimate son Edmund after being told lies about his faithful son Edgar. Madness and tragedy befall both ill-starred fathers.

Having subdued the Goths, warrior Titus Andronicus returns to Rome to bury his sons, with Gothic Queen Tamora and her retinue as captives. The newly-dead Roman Emperor's two sons, Saturninus and Bassianus, are competing for their father's title. According to Roman custom, Titus sacrifices Tamora's eldest son to the Gods; having the deciding vote, he also chooses Saturninus as Emperor. Both acts have tragic consequences.

BBC rendition of Shakespeare's Coriolanus

The life of King Henry the Sixth, in three parts.

Seven noble families fight for control of the mythical land of Westeros. Friction between the houses leads to full-scale war. All while a very ancient evil awakens in the farthest north. Amidst the war, a neglected military order of misfits, the Night's Watch, is all that stands between the realms of men and icy horrors beyond.

The life of Prince John, youngest child of Britain's King George V and Queen Mary, who died at the age of 13 in 1919.

The Tudors is a history-based drama series following the young, vibrant King Henry VIII, a competitive and lustful monarch who navigates the intrigues of the English court and the human heart with equal vigor and justifiable suspicion.

The story of Elizabeth of York, the White Queen's daughter, and her marriage to the Lancaster victor, Henry VII. Based on the Philippa Gregory book of the same name.

Set against the backdrop of the Wars of the Roses, the series is the story of the women caught up in the protracted conflict for the throne of England.

A series of British television films featuring William Shakespeare's History Plays.

A chronicle of the life of the Greek hero who after killing his three sons must perform five labors to repent.

Mary, Queen of Scots, faces political and sexual intrigue in the treacherous world of the French court.

Cunning plans and cutting comedy as the Blackadder dynasty plot their way through British history.

An animated adaptation of twelve of Shakespeare's best-known plays. The series was produced by S4C for the BBC, but animated by some of the foremost artists of Soyuzmultfilm, the former Soviet Union's main animation studio. Each 26-minute play is directed by a different animator, in a wide variety of styles: cel animation for Macbeth, stop-motion puppets in Twelfth Night, and paint on glass for Hamlet.

The Hundred Years’ war between England and France gave us the victories of Crecy and Agincourt, and made the reputations of Edward III and Henry V. It gave France a national heroine in Joan of Arc. But, even now, the jury is out as to its causes and outcome. Was it the final swansong of a redundant knightly class whose only reason for being was to fight? Was it a battle over ever more important territory to the emerging economies of England and France? Or was it the painful birth of two distinct national identities, forged through their long and violent divorce? Dr Janina Ramirez guides us through the stories of kings, great knights, bloody battles and cultural triumphs of this momentous conflict.

The Devil's Crown was a BBC limited series which dramatised the reigns of three medieval Kings of England: Henry II and his sons Richard the Lionheart and John.

Drawing on newly available evidence, this epic series explores the Windsor dynasty's gripping family saga, providing fresh insights into how our royal family have survived four generations of crisis.

London, 1605. Robert Catesby, a 33-year old Warwickshire gentleman, devises a plot to blow up Parliament and kill the King.

The final months of Boleyn's life, her struggle with Tudor England's patriarchal society, her desire to secure a future for her daughter, Elizabeth, and the brutal reality of her failure to provide Henry with a male heir.