Jim Burge CV


	Jim Burge is a maker of narrative factual television programmes and a writer (he divides his time about equally between the two). His films combine visual innovation with strong storylines and carefully conceived structure. His production methods are flexible and he makes programmes efficiently and to budget. He has just finished an episode of David Starkey’s Monarchy series.

The Glorious Revolution
November 2006, Granada for Channel Four. David Starkey continues his Monarchy series up to the present day. In this episode he tells the remarkable story of how the English became so disenchanted with King James II that they invited an armed invasion from Holland. The extraordinary thing about the idea is that it worked. "Unfussy, thoughtful, superb television." (The Times).

Dark Enlightenment
January 2006, Blakeway Productions for MoreFour. Historian, Michael Burleigh, who has won acclaim and awards for his analysis of the rise of the German Third Reich, turns his attentions now to what has been called the fatal wound that western culture has dealt itself - the rejection of religion. He finds a world that has lost its way, an untold tale of heroism and a warning for us all.

An Indian Affair 1 - Rogue Trader
September 2003, Takeaway Media for Channel Four. Wrote screenplay and directed programme one; joined the production team of programme two about half way through. This series tells the story, through actuality and reconstruction, of the development of the British Empire in India. ".. intelligent and absorbing ... isn't afraid to dip into the prurient rumour box every now and again." (Time Out)

An Indian Affair 2 - First Fusion
October 2003, Takeaway Media for Channel Four. The first programme tells how Clive of India's used the British East India Company to fulfil his personal commercial ambitions. Episode two examines a moment in history when Britain and India nearly achieved a equal union of cultures, only to see it all destroyed by by the onset of a new British attitude at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Presented by Maria Misra.

Wheeling and Dealing.
The Day The World Took Off, episode 2
June 2000, Windfall Films for Channel 4. The series which, in a preview of one of his programmes, the Observer described as ".. One of those sexy, clever, well-made series which ratchets open the eyes and the mind .." spans 10,000 years of the history of civilization. There is no single presenter, but a group of five different historians work as a team to give an account, on a range of timescales and locations, of how the world became modern. Narrated by John Nettles

Ships of Fortune
The Day The World Took Off, episode 3
The two programmes tell the story of the development of industrial consumerism in Europe and the formation of global trade empires. They use a wide variety of techniques - film, beta, super-8, DV, mini DV - in a series of impressionistic sequences, reconstructions and dramatisations. We meet a couple who are ruined by tulipmania, images of hell in a factory, a seventeenth century sailing ship, and a chess-playing robot.

Changes
September 1998, Diverse Production for Channel Four. We meet a little girl plagued by nightmares; a woman whose dream knight in armour turned out to be real; a holocaust survivor who is haunted by the only dream she has had in fifty years; and a woman who, on the point of death, considers a recurring dream she has had all her life. All of these people have been profoundly affected by their dreams, and all of them use those dreams to understand life. Poet Al Alvarez called the film "a brilliant programme full of subtlety, feeling and restraint."

Inspiration
March 1998, Diverse Production for Channel Four. Freud thought that dreams were coded messages about hidden desires. But Freud was wrong, according to Californian literary critic Bert States. He takes us for a walk through the set of Lethal Weapon 4 while he explains that dreams are personal acts of creativity ready to be used by all of us. Comedian Dave Thompson (the original Tinkywinky of the Tellytubbies), shoe designer Patrick Cox, and artist Jane Gifford all talk about how they use dreams in their work. Narrated by Robert Lindsay, this programme opened the series.

What If?: President King
Completed in July 1996 for Discovery Channel through Barraclough Carey and first aired in February 1997. The film, for which he wrote the screenplay and also directed, involves a mixture of dramatised scenes, including a super-8 footage sequence of the death of President King, interviews with real people who are role playing, and interviews with actors playing fictional people. The use of archive together with specially shot footage and the genuine feel of the interviews combine to make this a disturbingly convincing imitation of a genuine TV documentary.

Before starting on What If? he had realised a long term ambition and made a series about the Middle Ages, Strange Landscape, for BBC2. The medieval world of symbols, allegories, and weird beliefs had long been an area of interest for him. Presented by Christopher Frayling, it comprised five 50 minute programmes shown on BBC2 in May 1995. It was coproduced with Süddeutscher Rundfunk in Stuttgart and sold to PBS in the USA (where it was highest rated programme of the evening on WNET for each episode), also to stations in other countries including France, which for a series about French history made by an Englishman is an achievement. As well as masterminding the series he wrote and directed two of the episodes:


	The Hammer of the World March 1995 for SDR, produced at SDR in Stuttgart, in coproduction with BBC Worldwide. This is the story of the cruel but brilliant German Medieval Emperor, Friedrich II, who tried to rule the world in alliance with Italy. Friedrich was Dr. Goebbels' favourite historical character. Dramatisations shot in Italy and Germany using local people and actors.
	The Circles of Light May 1994, produced in London for BBC. The story of The Divine Comedy, Dante's fictional journey through the medieval universe. The film is a celebration of the world created one of the most visual writers of all time. It uses a variety of styles, from Italian 'B' Movie through Fellini pastiche to dramatic reconstruction. With the voice of Robert Lindsay as Dante, Edmund Dehn and Sofia Hodges. The film contains scenes from heaven and hell shot on location, and a disgusting scene of cannibalism.


	Taking the Credit May 1993, Box Productions for BBC Horizon, Science and Features. The story of the row between the USA and France and the alleged skulduggery over the discovery of the AIDS virus in the mid 1980's. Documentary and reconstructed scenes. Narrated by Janet Suzman with the music of Michael Nyman.
	The Evolving Soul September 1992, for BBC Religion. Anthony Clare introduces and narrates this film about evil, God, theology, chaos and a new understanding of nature. Filmed in Europe and America with rebel friar, Matthew Fox, and Nobel laureate, Illya Prigogine.


	The Transmission of Roger Bacon March 1992 written (using Bacon's original writings) and directed for BBC Timewatch. Michael Culver plays the irascible thirteenth century monk, Roger Bacon, who spends a day packing his life's work. He is dispatching it to the Pope in a desperate appeal for assistance in the development of military technology for the fight against the Antichrist.

Cold Fusion
May 1991 written and directed for BBC Horizon, coproduced with NOVA, WGBH Boston. The story of the two scientists who, in 1990, claimed to have discovered a way to produce free energy by creating nuclear fusion in a glass of water. "James Burge has taken the concept of cold fusion and made it pulse with excitement", Daily Mail. A tale of error and self-deception narrated by Peter Jones.


	Democracy June 1990 for BBC Documentary Features. The introductory film for a BBC2 season on democracy, the film consisted of a quick fire series of vignettes about the erosion of civil liberties in Britain. Introduced by Jonathan Dimbleby, Interviews with Lord Soper, Ken Livingstone, Tony Benn, and others.

	The Hope of Progress May 1988 for BBC Horizon. A biography of Sir Peter Medawar, a scientist of great charismatic charm who rose to the heights of British society. The film had no commentary apart from the words of Medawar's autobiography, read by Alan Howard, with music by Carl Davis. This programme was given the British Association for the Advancement of Science television award in February 1989.
	Greek Fire 1990, Transatlantic Films for Channel 4. Series of ten half hours about the legacy of ancient Greek culture. Worked on programmes about Drama, Politics, Sex, Philosophy, and (of course) Science. Included dramatisations from Euripides' The Bacchae as well as a unique realisation of one of the oldest film scenarios ever written - Plato's image of the cave in The Republic.
	Thinking March 1988 for BBC Horizon. With Reith Lecturer, American Philosopher John Searle, this film was about consciousness. It contains a dramatisation in Cantonese of Searle's philosophical parable of the Chinese Room. It is also Juliet Stevenson's debut as a television narrator. Selected by John Wakefield in The Observer: "Expert's Expert" as the best example of the television of ideas in 1988.


	What Einstein Never Knew March 1987 for BBC Horizon, coproduced with NOVA, WGBH Boston. Visual and imaginative review of the search for a unified theory of physics. Produced and directed jointly with Andrew Millington. American TV host, David Letterman, said that it must have been about hair care.

A Life Of Their Own: An award winning series of films about mentally handicapped adults and children. — What Do I Do? Two dramas about philosophy, specially written by Roy Kift. — The Geneva Event: An observational film about an experiment at CERN. It was also shown in the Horizon series and on WGBH's NOVA. — Space and Time: A series involving science fiction stories and effects, also won awards. — Quest for Knowledge: An impressionistic trip around a square mile of London narrated by Michael Aspel and Valentine Dyall. Starting in the British Museum it ended with an interview with a prostitute at King's Cross. Music of The Penguin Café Orchestra.


	He had joined the BBC as a Floor Assistant where his first job was to marshal the extras for the orgy scenes in I Claudius. He worked on two series of It Ain't Half Hot Mum, two of Are You Being Served?, two series of The Good Life and more Top of the Pops and Playschools than you would think possible. He was later to appear inside a Dalek in an episode of Crackerjack.


	Before starting at the BBC he had prepared himself for a career in the media by taking a degree in Mathematics and Philosophy. Although he spent his time dreaming and watching (and making) films, this episode persuaded some people that he was a scientist.

At school, at Elizabeth College in Guernsey in the Channel Islands, he was very good at mathematics, an ability which was a blessing in that it afforded him the profound pleasure of abstract thought but a curse in that it made people think he was a scientist. It was at school that he obtained his most recent scientific qualification to date: 'O' Level Chemistry.

Finally, he would just like to mention his latest book. It was published last year (this year in the United States) to very good reviews and even reasonable sales.

Heloise and Abelard: A Twelfth Century Love Story (find out more)
His most recent work is a book: Heloise and Ablelard (Profile Books, November 2003) is about the medieval lovers whose letters, preserved for 900 years, not only tell their story but open a miraculous window onto their thoughts and feelings. "Intelligent, clearly written ... lucid and perceptive" (Independent) "James Burge opens up this tale with sympathy and directness … beautifully explained" (Daily Mail). "The two lovers are as vivid as one could wish … He reminds us that, for Abelard and Heloise, their world was as new, risky and unpredictable as ours" (Sunday Times) He retells this love story in a vigorous style which reads as easily as a novel ... an enjoyable introduction to one of the most dramatic of all medieval stories (Benedicta Ward)

This CV can be seen in full colour along with additional information at my website www.jamesburge.co.uk



CAREER AND FILMS
Jim Burge Homepage	Download printable .pdf version of this CV


	This followed on the heels of another historian’s view of the decline of the West:


	Before that he produced two programmes for Channel Four's series about the British Raj in India:


	Before that he produced and directed two programmes for the Channel Four millennium technology series, The Day The World Took Off:


	Before that he made two films for In Your Dreams, the Channel 4 series about dreams and dreamers:


	Before that he wrote and directed a fictional film about Martin Luther King becoming President of the United States:


	Before spending two years as series producer and fundraiser for Strange Landscape he had made documentaries and drama documentaries in various areas, mostly for the BBC:


	Earlier he had made an attempt to escape from science with a medieval drama:


	Before that it had been science again with Horizon, but probably one of the funniest Horizons ever made:


	This had been preceded by a successful holiday from science:


	And before that:


	A degree in mathematics combined with a knowledge of television had brought him to the BBC's Open University Production Centre. While there he made about thirty programmes on Maths, Education, Arts, Technology and Science, among which were:


	In 1987 he had left the staff of the BBC to go freelance. He had been a producer with the BBC's Open University Production Centre where he made films about Science, Technology, Education, and Mathematics, as well as being a reader of physics texts. In addition to that he had also made a film on attachment to Horizon: