In My Own Words - Season 1

Neither Parkinson's disease nor age have diminished Billy Connolly's wit or wisdom in this astonishingly intimate self-portrait of the stand-up pioneer turned cultural icon.

Told in his own words, with unflinching honesty and access to a superlative archive rather than the oft-told story of his career, this is a surprising and delightful meditation on the joys of growing older and wiser as he looks back on his triumphs and failings as an entertainer, husband and father.

Alison Lapper – an artist, a muse, a mother – explores her life through art and archive in this visually rich and emotionally intimate documentary as she emerges from the most difficult period of her life after the loss of her son Parys.

Hanif Kureishi is one of Britain's most eminent and outspoken writers, whose work encompasses fiction, plays, screenwriting and non-fiction essays. Now, in this definitive and intimate film, Kureishi reflects on his life and work, and with his characteristic honesty and wit gives a fascinating insight into how a life's experience can be transformed into art.

Using personal photographs, family footage and his films, Kureishi recalls the trajectory of postwar immigrant experience in the UK, from his father's arrival in Bromley to the Satanic Verses, and what that still means today. Race is central to his work and thinking, but also spilling out of this film are funny stories and tender moments which show the man as a brave and challenging writer but also an affectionate and loving father and friend.

Jackie Kay is one of Britain's most loved and lauded poets. She is also a playwright and writer, and from 2016 until 2021 was Scotland's makar, the national poet for Scotland. Her unique and emotive work spans race, gender and identity, woven with tenderness and humour, often drawing from her own unusual beginnings.

Jackie recounts her extraordinary life story: born to a Scottish mother and Nigerian father, she was adopted as a baby by Helen and John Kay, active Communist Party members whose passion for politics and a fairer society fuelled Jackie's path in life and her writing. Reflecting on her journey from adopted child to award-winning poet, she recounts the adversity she has experienced, from childhood racism to the long and emotional journey to find her birth parents and the more recent process of grieving her much-loved adoptive parents, whose death signalled the end of a chapter in Jackie's life. Throughout this path to find herself, Jackie has used words and literature as a way to capture and process her story.

Best-selling novelist and journalist Jilly Cooper reflects on her life and work. Now aged 87, she recalls her childhood in Yorkshire, and her early career in journalism and publishing in the 1950s and 1960s. Jilly revisits the home in south-west London she left 42 years ago, where she lived with her late husband Leo and her children. She also discusses married life, her attitude to sex, moving to the Cotswolds, and the breakthrough success of her 1985 novel, Riders.