The “BBC Select” label is something of a nod to a previous BBC offering. In an earlier avatar, between 1992 and 1995, BBC Select was an overnight subscription service that ran between 2am and 6am, after the BBC channels had shut down. The programming was aimed at specialist audiences like businessmen, lawyers, nurses and teachers.
Shows that will be available on the new streamer include the work of Turner Prize-winning artist Grayson Perry and his programs on class, masculinity and identity, including his latest, “Grayson Perry: Big American Road Trip”; author and social documentarian Stacey Dooley, host of Stacey Dooley’s series “Brainwashing Stacey”; historian Professor Simon Schama’s new series “The Romantic Revolution”; and a collection of filmmaker Louis Theroux’s output, including “Selling Sex,” “Surviving America’s Most Hated Family” and “Talking to Anorexia.”
Exclusives to the service include “Shock of the Nude,” hosted by Professor Mary Beard, a take on the nude in western art; “Reggie Yates in China,” which explores fault-lines in Chinese society; “In Search of Frida Kahlo,” which follows musician Emeli Sandé as she tells the artist’s story; and “Fall of an Icon,” exploring the life of Myanmar politician Aung San Suu Kyi.