Channel 4 is marking its 40th birthday with a musical about Prince Andrew and a programme about unusually large penises.
The broadcaster announced that it would air a satirical musical about the life of the Queen’s second son, who had to step back from public life due to his association with the paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
As part of a season of programmes designed to hark back to Channel 4’s “radical, irreverent and iconoclastic roots”, it has also commissioned a documentary about people who struggle with their penis size.
Other new shows will include a documentary about a woman who fled the Taliban and is now a successful porn performer, a show in which Jimmy Carr explores “cancel culture”, and a revival of Ben Elton’s 1980s comedy show Friday Night Live.
The Prince Andrew musical has been written by the comedian Kieran Hodgson, who stars as the royal who paid a multimillion-pound financial settlement over a claim from Virginia Giuffre, who accused him of sexual assault in a US civil case. The Duke of York denies the claims.
The show promises to explore the “key events, relationships, and controversies of Andrew’s life”, including his Newsnight interview with Emily Maitlis. It is one of a number of television programmes about the prince in the works, with Maitlis and the former BBC producer Sam MacAlister working on rival shows about his very public downfall – hastened by the decision to give a tell-all interview in which he claimed he could not sweat.
Channel 4 has repeatedly said its unique status as a publicly owned broadcaster enables it to make programmes that for-profit broadcasters could not afford to take. It also recently recorded strong financial results. Despite this, Boris Johnson’s government has pressed ahead with plans to sell the channel – which often annoys Conservative MPs with its current affairs coverage – arguing that it would thrive in the private sector.
Liz Truss, the favourite to be the next prime minister, has indicated that she intends to proceed with the sale, which could be completed next year. This means the latest programme announcements could be among the final shows commissioned under Channel 4’s existing operating model.
The new line-up could be seen as either purposefully designed to wind up the Conservative politicians who are planning to privatise Channel 4 – or a sign of a midlife crisis.
Politicians scrutinising the case for privatisation are likely to reference Too Large for Love, the documentary that talks to the “hidden minority of men who have an extra-large penis” and meets individuals whose “extra-large penises are ruining their lives”.
Channel 4’s programme boss, Ian Katz, said the new commissions were “a collection of irreverent, thought-provoking and hugely entertaining shows that no other broadcaster would air”.
He added: “If we must age, we plan to do it disgracefully.”
