Broadcaster and comedy legend Sir Michael Palin’s last excursion for the BBC was in 2012, ending a 23-year documentary career with the corporation.
The 81-year-old had hosted a series of travel documentaries since 1989 before quitting the broadcaster.
He has since preferred to work with Channel 5, covering travel from Iraq to North Korea, but the reason for turning his back on the BBC remained a mystery.
However, Palin has now revealed the real reason he decided to jump ship in an interview laying bare the issues he suffered during his career.
Broadcaster and comedy legend Sir Michael Palin’s last excursion for the BBC was in 2012, ending a 23-year documentary career with the corporation. He is seen in an episode of Brazil With Michael Palin
Palin said he felt the BBC ‘wanted to interfere a little more’ and to ‘control’ his shows
He told Radio Times that he left because he was ‘absolutely, desperately frustrated’ with the BBC trying to control his documentaries.
Palin described the corporation of having ‘this new way of presenting shows’ in which they would show the viewers the best bits in the first five minutes.
‘Otherwise, as soon as they see Michael Palin, they’ll switch off,’ he said, indicating bosses were concerned that his star power might not be enough to convince viewers to stick around.
He added: ‘There was the feeling that the BBC wanted to interfere a little more. They wanted to control it a little more.
‘The BBC were going in a different direction and presentation was going in a different direction.’
Following his departure, he also said he ‘felt very let down’ when the editorial standards team upheld a complaint that accused his series of oversimplifying the Balkan war.
Palin with Sophia O’Sullivan, one of his guides in Salvador, Brazil in the series ‘Out of Africa’
Palin described the corporation of having ‘this new way of presenting shows’ in which they would show the viewers the best bits in the first five minutes
It comes after the Monty Python star revealed his regrets about leaving his wife Helen while she was severely ill to make travel documentaries.
The mother of their three children – Thomas, 56, William, 53, and Rachel, 49 – had been suffering chronic pain for several years and then developed kidney failure.
She passed away at the Marie Curie Hospice in Hampstead, north London, on May 2, 2023.
Palin said: ‘I don’t have regrets really. Perhaps towards the end, when I was doing the later travel journeys like North Korea.
‘Helen was then less well, less good at looking after herself, unfortunately, and that was a slightly difficult time.
‘I don’t think she particularly wanted me to go away then, but she knew that my interest in travel and other people was very deep-seated, it wasn’t because I wanted to get away from home — it wasn’t that at all.’
Michael Palin is seen in the series ‘Quest for Artemisia’
Last week the actor heartbreakingly admitted that his late wife’s clothes were still hanging ‘in the cupboard’ as they make it feel as if she was ‘still here’.
Over a year since his agonising loss, Michael told how he likes to see her belongings around their home as it reminds him of the time they spend together, with the star adding that it’s the reason he will never move.
The TV personality said he found it ‘odd’ with her not around, especially when coming home from the theatre or dinner and wanting to tell her about his experience.
He added that he misses ‘the little things’ about their relationship, adding that he still finds it ‘very difficult’ without her – especially when it comes to cooking.
MailOnline has contacted the BBC for comment.
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