John Willis is one of Britain's best known television executives. He is a former Director of Programmes at Channel 4 and Director of Factual and Learning at the BBC. He was Vice-president of National Programs at WGBH Boston. In 2012 he was elected as Chair of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA). He started his career as a documentary maker and won a string of major awards for his films including Johnny Go Home, Alice - A Fight for Life, Rampton - The Secret Hospital, and of course Churchill's Few on which this book is based. He is currently Chair of Mentorn Media, producers of Question Time for BBC and he also chairs the Board of Governors at the Royal Central School for Speech and Drama. He divides his time between London and Norfolk.
Reviews of the documentary on which the book is based - The most moving programme of the week. The film was beautifully made by John Willis. -- Alexander Chancellor * The Spectator * Reviews of the documentary on which the book is based - Willis's characteristic sensitivity produces a film which praises yesterday's bravery without sparing society's embarrassment at their appearance today. -- Mark Lawsom * The Times * Reviews of the documentary on which the book is based - An exemplary memoir of the kind that ought to be made while the participants are still lively. -- Philip Purser * The Sunday Telegraph * Reviews of the documentary on which the book is based - Eerie unsettling perspective of a pacifist's analysis of the second world war...the remaining members of the famous few are revealed not as heroes but as flotsam in a sea of forgetting. * The Sunday Times *