70 Up Nick Hitchon footage
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Viewers were left in tears after 70 Up showed footage from Nick Hitchon's life ahead of his final interview filmed just days before his death.
ITV aired the first instalment of 70 Up on Tuesday, one of the final episodes of the world's longest-running documentary series 7 Up.
Sixty-two years after the first episode was broadcast in 1964, viewers were left in tears as they watched as the programme caught up with the participants at age 70.
The programme was actually meant to conclude with 63 Up in 2019, following the death of director Michael Apted, but it was participant Nick Hitchon's devastating cancer diagnosis which prompted the filmmakers to return – this time with Academy Award-winning director Asif Kapadia at the helm.
In 2023, Hitchon sent producer Claire Lewis an 'almost coded email' telling her that he intended to be here for the 70 Up series, but Lewis said 'reading between the lines of his emails, I realised how extraordinarily ill he was'.
While the final series hadn't yet been commissioned, Lewis persuaded ITV to fly her and a camera crew out to visit 65-year-old Hitchon in 2023, where he recorded a final interview. Hitchon died three days after filming.
ITV aired the first instalment of 70 Up on Tuesday, the final episodes of the world's longest-running documentary series 7 Up. The finale features a final interview with Nick Hitchon
Viewers were in tears at Hitchon's section of the film, which featured him aged six telling the filmmakers his dream 'to find out all about the moon and all that' (pictured in 1964)
Viewers watching the first episode of 70 Up on Tuesday saw footage of Hitchon throughout the years before a teaser for the final instalment, due to air on September 22, ended with a clip of Nick at his home in the US.
He is heard saying in a voiceover: 'I had no idea that I was going to be this ill and I had no idea I was going to keep on living.'
'But yes I think it's a surprise to my doctors that I'm still around.'
Viewers were in tears at Hitchon's section of the film, which featured him aged seven telling the filmmakers about his dream 'to find out all about the moon and all that'.
The son of a Yorkshire farmer, Hitchon went on to study at the University of Oxford before moving to the US in the early 80s where he worked as a nuclear fusion expert and university professor in Wisconsin.
He married his Oxford university girlfriend Jacqui and went on to welcome a son before his divorce at the age of 42, telling the documentary that 'the moment of pure, unadulerated joy in my life was when my son was handed to me when he was born'.
A clip was shown of Hitchon speaking in 2019 for 63 Up, when he revealed his cancer diagnosis on camera.
'Well as you can see I have lost 60Ib in the last year, I am seriously ill. I have a cancer in my throat and I don't know what the prognosis... I don't know what's going to happen,' he told the show.
'So I'm not really focused on the long-term future. I'm focused on fairly short-term futures at the moment. I'm just keeping going and not asking too many questions about the long term.'
The programme was actually meant to conclude with 63 Up in 2019, following the death of director Michael Apted, but it was participant Nick Hitchon's devastating cancer diagnosis which prompted the filmmakers to return (pictured in 63 Up in 2019)
The son of a Yorkshire farmer, Hitchon went on to study at the University of Oxford before moving to the US in the early 80s where he worked as a nuclear fusion expert (pictured in 21 Up in 1977)
'This section with Nick is hard, and I think we all know that he's no longer with us. God bless him. I am currently in remission, and Nick is right. Focus shifts to the short term. What can we - all of us - do with the time we have left? Not waste it, would be a start,' wrote one emotional viewer on X.
'Kleenex at the ready for the final 10 mins? Nick,' added another, whilst one wrote: 'I'm bawling already knowing Nick is no longer with us.'
'All of it is making me very emotional. In the blink of an eye, hopes and aspirations are just distant memories and time has run out. Life is over so very quickly. Too quickly,' agreed one more.
In the final episode viewers will see Hitchon's last interview in which he reveals that he had a stroke in 2022.
'It's a surprise to my doctors that I'm still around. Curious really,' he tells the cameras. 'One was saying: "It does happen that people survive" but made it clear he didn't expect it. They should train them to be more tactful.'
Admitting that he was so weak he could barely walk more than a few steps, he says that his illness has been hard on his family, including his second wife, Cryss Brunner. 'Everybody has had to pick up the slack and I feel awful about it,' he says.
'This section with Nick is hard, and I think we all know that he's no longer with us. God bless him' wrote one viewer on Tuesday
A camera crew flew out to 65-year-old Hitchon in 2023, where he recorded a final interview. Hitchon died three days after filming (pictured in 56 Up in 2012)
The TV star also adds poignantly that filming the show was 'tremendously important' to him.
In his final words to camera he tells the crew: 'When you guys pack up and leave, and I'm fairly sure we're not going to do this again, I will feel there is a hole in things that I've not experienced since I was six.'
Hitchon's brother, Andrew, wrote a piece for the Telegraph, explaining how much his late sibling had pushed to have one final on-camera interview.
'Nick was a determined character, and it seems likely to me that he wanted to finish what he had started,' he said.
'I hope that 70 Up will bring [the cast] proper closure and allow them to let go of a phenomenon they have coexisted with for more than six decades. Most of all, I hope filming that last interview did the same for Nick.'
The final episode of 70 Up featuring Hitchon's final appearance will air on September 22 on ITV.
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