Holding Back the Years — Season 1

By meeting remarkable members of the public and using fascinating archive footage, celebrities get to the bottom of key concerns related to ageing.

In this edition, Maureen Lipman returns to her home town of Hull to meet people who have found different ways to stay social and avoid loneliness in later years. She hears stories of triumph and tragedy from regulars at a local bingo hall and listens to the highly vocal opinions of customers and volunteers alike at the Royal Voluntary Service club. Maureen witnesses the dramatic difference made to peoples' lives by a kennels that specialises in offering dogs to older people and also meets men who have found companionship in their supersized shed. Finally, she encounters a group who have put the social into learning, and asks a couple their secret after a marriage lasting over 60 years.

In this episode, Angela Rippon travels to Devon to take a thought-provoking look at the different ways people can retire in Britain today, as well as meeting those who simply do not want to. First, she visits a luxury type of senior living for the lucky ones who can afford it. Helping out at a local charity shop, Angela meets a pensioner who leads a very frugal life and who shares some of her unusual money-saving tips. Finally, Angela heads to the local hospital to meet an 83-year-old nurse who has no intention of retiring, and she speaks to Martyn Rogers of Age UK, who has advice on how people of all ages should be thinking about their retirement now.

In this edition, Ainsley Harriott returns to his boyhood home in Wandsworth in south London. There, he visits a community centre bringing some Caribbean sunshine to London. He also meets 100-year-old Helen Clare, who made a name for herself as a singer during the Second World War, and takes her to the London hotel she first sang in over 70 years ago, and where he has arranged a magical surprise for her.

In this edition, Arlene Phillips returns to her home city of Manchester to meet people who are determined to live life to the full whatever their age. Arlene tries indoor skydiving with a group of ladies who say yes to almost anything. She meets a woman in her 60s considering yet another cosmetic procedure and talks to 71-year-old Jenny-Anne Bishop OBE, a transgender woman who left it late in life to make the full transition. Finally, Arlene retraces her steps to when she first moved to London and meets businesswoman Debbie Moore, head of the iconic Pineapple Dance Studios.

In this episode, Bill Turnbull travels to Edinburgh to expose some of the fake news about health in old age. He meets the pensioners involved in a unique experiment that dates back to the 1940s and looks at how the results it is producing today could help the scientific breakthroughs of tomorrow. He gains access to a virtual hospital whose team monitor and treat patients - someof whom live hundreds of miles away - from a central HQ. And he explores the ways of fighting the ageing process, from the OAP gym bunnies and mediation through yoga to the ways technology is revolutionising mobility issues in old age.