Meanwhile, Einstein is lured back from Zürich to the Prussian Academy of Sciences in Berlin in an attempt to aid the war effort by embarrassing Britain by disproving the work of its great scientist Isaac Newton. At the outbreak of the First World War, Eddington is appointed chief astronomer at Cambridge by Sir Oliver Lodge and instructed to research Einstein's work and defend the Newtonian status quo. The prelude is set in 1919 on Eddington's expedition in Príncipe to observe the solar eclipse that year, before moving back in time to 1914. It was first broadcast on BBC Two on 22 November 2008. This is the story of Einstein's general theory of relativity, his relationship with Eddington and the introduction of this theory to the world, against the backdrop of the Great War and Eddington's eclipse observations.
It featured David Tennant as British scientist Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington, and Andy Serkis as Albert Einstein.
BBC DVD cover, featuring Andy Serkis as Einstein (top) and David Tennant as Eddington (bottom)Įinstein and Eddington is a British single drama produced by Company Pictures and the BBC, in association with HBO.