Discovery to showcase 'Extraordinary Women'

MUMBAI: Infotainment broadcaster Discovery will air a new series ‘Extraordinary Women‘ starting 19 June every Tuesday at 8 pm.

This will reveal the stories of women, who overcame adverse conditions and social prejudices to rise to the top of their field to earn the admiration of millions across the world.

They rewrote the rules for women of their time, stepping out of the shadows of men to make their own mark in history. Audrey Hepburn, Grace Kelly, Coco Chanel, Audrey Hepburn and Agatha Christie are some of the women who will be profiled on the show. The women featured achieved success in fields as diverse as fashion, cinema, politics, philanthropy, technology and activism.

They seemed to have it all, but often the trials and tribulations of their personal lives were masked by their public success. Featuring archive, interviews and dramatic re-enactment, the show reveals the price these extraordinary women paid for their achievements. Yet in the end, they overcame all adversities to emerge as triumphant, inspirational icons of the 20th century, the channel said.

A Special Ambassador to Unicef, Hepburn was one of the first to recognise that her celebrity status could be used to improve the lives of many less fortunate people. Hedy Lamarr is best known as a star of MGM‘s golden age, but she was also the co-inventor of an early form of spread spectrum communications technology, a key to modern wireless communications. Coco Chanel was an illegitimate child, born into a poorhouse and abandoned in an orphanage, but she rose from unimaginable poverty to create the most iconic fashion brand of the 20th century, The House of Chanel.

Josephine Baker a black entertainer took the world by storm; determined to escape a life of deprivation and racial prejudice, she danced her way to New York and then Paris. In a remarkable life spanning eight decades, Maria Montessori challenged convention to pioneer a new system of education; she leaves a legacy of thousands of Montessori schools across the world. Agatha Christie, the Queen of Crime Fiction wrote 80 novels and short stories; but, her private life remains as mysterious as any of the characters in her novels.