David Attenborough: filmography, biography and personal life

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

In the UK, every elementary school student knows who David Attenborough is. His name is strongly associated with nature films. Over the years, his voice has been voiced off-screen for short, half-hour episodes about various animals. Several generations of Britons have grown up watching these educational films, broadcast on the BBC from 1977 to the present day. But not only thanks to the voice, the name of David Attenborough has become recognizable all over the world, and he himself often appears in the frame. His presence in the films makes the storytelling more believable. But what does the general public know about the personal life of this naturalist, director, screenwriter, TV presenter and, by the way, a good writer? Has he made any other films? We will cover this in our article.

Childhood

David Attenborough (David Frederick Attenborough) was born back in 1926 on the eighth of May. He saw the light in Isleworth (an area in west London). But childhoodThe future naturalist took place at the University College of Leicester, on a campus whose director was his father Frederick. David was the middle child in the family. His older brother Richard went on to become a famous actor and director. The youngest in the family, John, also achieved success in life. He was destined to become the manager of the Alfa Romeo automobile company. As a child, David was fond of paleontology and geology. He even had his own "museum" in which he exhibited fossils, rocks, and rock specimens. During the Second World War, the family was replenished with two girls. The parents of the three Attenborough brothers adopted Jewish refugees who escaped the Holocaust in Europe.

Education

David's childhood hobbies already determined his training and subsequent career. After completing his primary education on the campus of University College Leicester, he enrolled at Wiggeston Boys' Grammar School. There, David Attenborough showed his talents and won a scholarship to study at the University of Cambridge, where he studied zoology and geology. He graduated from Clare College with a Bachelor of Arts in Science. When the young man was twenty-one years old, he went to serve in the army of the Royal Navy of Wales and Scotland. In 1950, having retired from the reserve, David got married. His chosen one was Jane Elizabeth Ebsworth Oriel. With her, David lived a happy family life. The couple had two children: son Robert and daughter Susan. David was widowed in 1997. His son Robert followed in his father's footsteps. He teaches bioanthropology at the SchoolArcheology at the Australian National University in Canberra.

Working for the BBC

Immediately after the army, David Attenborough got a job at a publishing house that produced children's non-fiction literature. And there he learned one important thing: to speak about the complex in a simple and accessible language. Already in 1952, he went to work for the BBC channel. At first he participated in radio programs, and soon he will appear in the frame: in "Trends in the Animal World." This TV show was filmed in a duet with Julian Huxley (famous naturalist) at the London Zoo. The camouflage, mating rituals and aposematism that exist in the wild were revealed in such an accessible and interesting way that the public was eager to continue. Therefore, in 1954, the BBC directs attention to Attenborough in Sierra Leone (an African country), where a naturalist is filming a series of adventures with wild animals. A year later, a new series from Latin America was released. This was followed by filming expeditions to Australia, to the Komodo Islands and Madagascar. In 1969-1972, a prominent director served as director of broadcasts for the BBC.

David Attenborough: "Life on Earth"

In the late seventies, the director conceived a truly epoch-making idea. Her working title was "Three E". The project was to tell as much as possible about evolution, ecology and ethology. However, three series were released under different names: "Life on Earth", "The Living Planet" and "The Trials ofLife". Although in these cycles of programs the director fully embodied his idea. In the Russian box office, all three series begin with the word "Life". In the Soviet Union, they began to be broadcast on television since 1986. The first "Life" with David Attenborough (1979) narrates about the origin of protein creatures on planet Earth and their evolution. The second series tells about the main areas of distribution of animals, it is called "Living Planet". The third cycle is devoted to the problems of ethology, psychology and behavior of animals. It was filmed in 1990 and called "Tests of Life" In these three series, the viewer is introduced to the basic concepts of biology.

"Life" and its sequels

Three E's were a wild success not only in the UK: the BBC channel sold them to many countries around the world. David Attenborough himself was not going to stop there. "Life" was continued in seven more series. In 1993, the scientist traveled to Antarctica. After that, the cycle "Life in the freezer" was released. Further, the series "Private Life of Plants", "… Birds", "… Mammals" went on. The scientist also decided to reveal to the viewer the invisible existence of microorganisms in the series "Life in the Undergrowth". He spoke about reptiles and amphibians in "Life with Cold Blood". The last series about nature was released in 2009. It's simply called Life and is a sequel to the old 1984 film The Living Planet. But we must pay tribute to this repetition: it was filmed in high definition television standard. All in allthese ten cycles are more than two hundred and fifty series.

David Attenborough Filmography

The scientist and writer is not limited in his interests to biology alone. He repeatedly made documentaries on other topics. Among them, first of all, it should be noted "Lost worlds - life that has disappeared." This series is about paleontology. In the "First Eden" cycle, the scientist introduces the viewer to the course of human life at the dawn of civilization, and in the series "Eye of the Savage" he tries to show the art of primitive tribes from the inside. Ecology, whose champion has always been David Attenborough, did not stand aside. The films "The State of the Planet" and "The Whole Truth About Climate Change" are dedicated to environmental issues.

Did David Attenborough retire?

The scientist and screenwriter announced his intention to retire, in connection with which the "BBC" began to look for a replacement for the cult hero of series about nature. True, Attenborough still has no worthy successors. But the director himself is in no hurry to retire. In 2009, he filmed "First Life" ("First Life") - a film dedicated to the earliest animal species. And in 2011, the premiere of the seven-episode cycle "Frozen Planet" took place. For the sake of filming this film, the elderly director even went to the North Pole. David Attenborough's work has won many awards. He is a Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order and Commander of the Order of the British Empire. He was awarded the Order of Merit and Honor.