Darwin's Darkest Hour
Premiere Broadcast on PBS: Tuesday, October 6, 2009
NOVA and National Geographic Television present the
extraordinary human drama that led to the birth of the most
influential scientific theory of all time. In this two-hour
special, acclaimed screenwriter John Goldsmith (David Copperfield, Victoria and Albert) brings to life Charles Darwin's
greatest personal crisis: the anguishing decision over whether
to "go public" with his theory of evolution. Darwin, portrayed
by Henry Ian Cusick (Lost), spent years refining his
ideas and penning his "Big Book,"
On the Origin of Species. Yet, daunted by looming
conflict with the orthodox religious values of his day, he
resisted publishing—until a letter from naturalist
Alfred Wallace forced his hand. In 1858, Darwin learned that
Wallace was on the brink of publishing ideas very similar to
his own. In a sickened panic, Darwin grasped his dilemma: To
delay publishing any longer would be to condemn all of his
work to obscurity—his voyage on the Beagle, his
adventures in the Andes, the gauchos and bizarre fossils of
Patagonia, the finches and giant tortoises of the Galapagos.
But to come forward with his ideas risked the fury of the
Church and perhaps a rift with his own devoted wife, Emma,
portrayed by Frances O'Connor (Mansfield Park,
The Importance of Being Earnest, Steven Spielberg's
Artificial Intelligence), who clung to a devout,
orthodox view of creation. "Darwin's Darkest Hour" is a moving
drama about the birth of a great idea seen through the
inspiration and personal sufferings of its brilliant
originator.
What Darwin Never Knew
Premiere Broadcast on PBS: Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Earth teems with a staggering variety of animals, including
9,000 kinds of birds, 28,000 types of fish, and more than
350,000 species of beetles. What explains this explosion of
living creatures—1.4 million different species
discovered so far, with perhaps another 50 million to go? The
source of life's endless forms was a profound mystery until
Charles Darwin's revolutionary idea of natural selection,
which he showed could help explain the gradual development of
life on Earth. But Darwin's radical insights raised as many
questions as they answered. What actually drives evolution and
turns one species into another? And how did we evolve?
Now, on the 150th anniversary of Darwin's
On the Origin of Species, NOVA reveals answers to the
riddles that Darwin couldn't explain in this two-hour program.
Stunning breakthroughs in a brand-new science—nicknamed
"evo devo"—are linking the enigma of origins to another
of nature's great mysteries, the development of an embryo. To
explore this exciting new idea, NOVA takes viewers on a
journey from the Galapagos Islands to the Arctic, and from the
Cambrian explosion of animal forms half a billion years ago to
the research labs of today. Here scientists are finally
beginning to crack nature's biggest secrets at the genetic
level. And, as NOVA shows in this absorbing detective story,
the results are confirming the brilliance of Darwin's insights
while exposing clues to life's breathtaking diversity in ways
the great naturalist could scarcely have imagined.
