In 1944, Marjoe Gortner was just four years old when his parents had him ordained as an evangelical minister. He was dubbed ‘the miracle child’ and conducted his first marriage ceremony before he could barely even write. During the 1950s, he became a star turn on the American preaching circuit and attracted huge crowds for his exuberant preaching, raking in millions of dollars. Behind it all was an elaborate con and years later Marjoe went public with an expose that took him to Hollywood.

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

Get in touch: [email protected]

(Photo: A young Marjoe Gortner giving a sermon. Credit: Still from the documentary Marjoe, courtesy Sarah Kernonchan)

After pro-democracy protests broke out in 2011, Kholoud Helmi was determined to cover the human rights violations carried out by the Syrian government, as a reporter on the ground. So with the help of her friends and brother, she founded Enab Baladi, one of the only surviving independent media outlets founded in Syria. Kholoud paid a high price for this, risking her life, and the lives of her family, to report on atrocities happening in locations inaccessible to foreign reporters. The paper had to be printed in secret - and its copies would be distributed covertly in rubbish bins. The team did their best to avoid the military checkpoints scattered throughout the city, but they couldn't stay out of trouble forever. Kholoud's brother was arrested, and subsequently disappeared. 10 years later, Kholoud and her family still don't know whether he's dead or alive. After losing her home, brother, and friends to the civil war that has torn the country apart for over a decade, she continues to carry a dream of a free Syria with her. Jo Fidgen talks to her from Turkey, where she is currently living in exile.

Get in touch: [email protected]

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

(Photo: Kholoud Helmi speaking on the war in Syria. Credit: Michael Loccisano/Getty Images for HBO)

Scot Kate Ballard is the daughter of world-famous mountaineer Alison Hargreaves. In 1995, when Kate was just four, Alison was caught in a storm on K2 in the Himalayas and died. Despite the tragedy, Kate and her brother Tom were raised by their dad to love the slopes and it soon became clear that Tom shared his mother's climbing talent. But sadly he would also share her fate. Kate speaks to Jo Fidgen about travel to the Himalayas and how, despite her personal losses, her love of the mountains is undiminished. A film about the family is called The Last Mountain. It's by director Chris Terrill and is available to watch on BBC iPlayer and via online streaming services.

Get in touch: [email protected]

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

(Photo: Kate Ballard. Credit: Ballard Images)

Emily Webb explores the origins of The Chippendales with its co-founder and former lawyer Bruce Nahin. It started as a weekly club night in Los Angeles where male dancers stripped for women and it became a global sensation. But greed and jealousy would lead to scandal and murder.

Get in touch: [email protected]

Presenter: Emily Webb

(Photo: Silhouettes of Chippendales performers in cowboy hats. Credit: Getty/Gabe Ginsberg/ WireImage)

Singer-songwriter Frank Turner never got on with his distant and disapproving father. Things got even worse between them when Frank discovered the anarchist punk scene in his teens, and they eventually stopped speaking altogether. But after years of estrangement, Frank had a chance encounter with his father, aged 72, who told him: “I’m thinking of transitioning and living as a woman.” It changed everything between them, and their relationship is finally close and loving. Frank’s new album, FTHC, explores his personal journey.

Get in touch: [email protected]

Presenter: Mobeen Azhar

(Photo: Frank Turner. Credit: Total Guitar Magazine/Olly Curtis/Future Publishing via Getty Images)

Szymon Niemiec is a priest and an LGBTQ+ activist who founded Poland's first Gay Pride parade in 2001 - known locally as an 'equality parade'. Growing up in the Polish capital Warsaw, Szymon knew he was gay and at the same time knew he felt a close connection to the Church. But combining his religious belief, his sexuality and his activism was never easy in a predominantly Catholic country, and today it continues to make him a target.

Get in touch: [email protected]

Presenter: Mobeen Azhar

(Photo: Szymon Niemiec. Credit: Janek Skarzynski/AFP/Getty Images)

Mark MacDonald had always known he was adopted and was comfortable with it - but when he and his wife Tina found they couldn't safely have children of their own, he went looking for his birth family. After reaching out through adoption agencies, he quickly established a close relationship with long-lost sister Rachel Elliott, and - over a family dinner - a life-changing offer was made.

Mark and Rachel have written a book together called Love & Genetics: A true story of adoption, surrogacy, and the meaning of family.

Get in touch: [email protected]

Presenter: Mobeen Azhar

(Photo: (L-R) Mark, Rachel and Tina with the twins. Credit: Mark MacDonald)

Tim Carey was a talented but little-known artist working with stained glass, when a huge opportunity fell into his lap. A mega church was being built in Kansas, and Tim was asked to build a huge window for it. It would be the biggest stained glass window in the world - the size of a basketball court. Tim said yes, but deep down he had no idea whether he could actually pull it off, so he approached a maverick stained glass artist called Narcissus Quagliata, a legend in the field. Together they took on the project, and formed a close bond in the process. There's a film about their story called Holy Frit.

Presenter: Mobeen Azhar

Photo: Tim Carey and Narcissus Quagliata

In the 1990s the name 'Thomas Quick' struck fear into the hearts of Swedes across the country. He had confessed to more than 30 murders, and was convicted of eight. He became known as Sweden’s most notorious serial killer and the ‘Swedish Hannibal Lecter’ but almost two decades later he retracted his confessions and said he was innocent. Jenny Küttim is a Swedish journalist who has been covering the case since 2008 and Björn Asplund is the father of Johan Asplund, the first person Thomas Quick confessed to killing. This episode was first broadcast in September 2019.

Presenter: Asya Fouks

(Photo: Sture Bergwall/Thomas Quick after his release. (Credit: HENRIK MONTGOMERY/AFP via Getty Images)

Dianne O'Brien was born in the 1940s and grew up in an Irish-Australian family near Sydney. But when she was just 14, her world was torn apart: her beloved mother died, her father abandoned her and she discovered she was adopted. She was sent to a notorious children's home, where she gave birth to her first child, the result of a sexual assault.  Years later, she went in search of her birth family and discovered she was Indigenous, part of the Stolen Generation and a descendant of celebrated Indigenous Australian politicians. Dianne eventually went on to become a leader in her own right in the community she was taken from so many decades before.   

Presenter: Emily Webb

Get in touch: [email protected]

(Photo: Dianne O'Brien with her mother, aged two. Credit: Courtesy of Dianne O'Brien)