Ralph Lee returns to Channel 4 to head specialist factual team

Ralph Lee, Deputy Head of Specialist Factual

Channel 4 today announced that former Deputy Head of Specialist Factual Ralph Lee was returning to head his former commissioning team. Lee left the channel at the end of 2007 to take up the post of Head of Factual at Five.

Lee originally joined Channel 4 in September 2002 as specialist factual commissioning editor and was subsequently promoted to Deputy Head of Specialist Factual.  He was responsible for a broad range of commissions and most notably living history formats That'll Teach 'Em and Never Did Me Any Harm; genealogical series Empire's Children; Ian Hislop's critically-acclaimed series about the First World War, Not Forgotten; a number of ambitious drama documentaries including Blitz: London's Firestorm; The Somme, The Search for the Northwest Passage and Inside Waco; Time Team and Tony Robinson's ratings hit The Real Da Vinci Code and Worst  Jobs in History; historian Bettany Hughes' series Athens: The Truth about Democracy; a season about 20th century aristocrats High Society and acclaimed history feature Deep Water, about tragic round the world yachtsman, Donald Crowhurst.

Head of Channel 4, Julian Bellamy said: "Ralph is a leading talent in specialist factual programming and I am delighted that he is returning to Channel 4. His depth of knowledge and enthusiasm combined with his substantial track record for bringing fresh approaches to this genre make him the ideal candidate to lead our already high achieving commissioning team."

Ralph Lee said: "The specialist factual output from Channel 4 is among the most exciting and stimulating TV that hits our screens and the opportunity to come back and run the department is simply irresistible."

Prior to joining Channel 4, Lee was a freelance director and he made a number of documentaries and biographies for Channel 4 including RTS award winning The Real John Curry.

He began his TV career as an assistant on Peter Kosminsky's drama documentary The Dying of the Light for Yorkshire TV before working as a researcher in the independent sector and then at the BBC where he directed  programming for several theme nights on the main channel and for BBC Choice (later renamed BBC3).