Christopher Riley (born 1967) is a British writer, broadcaster and film maker specialising in the history of science. He has a PhD from Imperial College, University of London where he pioneered the use of digital elevation models in the study of mountain range geomorphology and evolution. He makes frequent appearances on British television and radio, broadcasting mainly on space flight, astronomy and planetary science and was visiting professor of science and media at the University of Lincoln between 2011 and 2021.
Education Riley went to school in Cambridge, where he grew up. He studied geology at the University of Leicester for his first degree and completed his PhD at Imperial College, University of London in the mid-1990s. Voyager's Final Message - Crowd sourcing one world to reach another, Response Source. The ultimate journey of human exploration comes to BBC ONE this November, BBC Press Office.
Career Riley is a veteran of two NASA astrobiology missions (Leonid MAC) from 1998 and 1999 – reporting on their progress for BBC News. – Return to Mission Leonid, BBC News – In the Leonids' lair, BBC News He co-presented the BBC's live coverage of the 1999, 2001 and 2015 solar eclipses.
He wrote and presented the BBC TWO astronomy magazine show Final Frontier, BBC TWO's live All Night Star Party – both co-productions with the Open University – The Open University Digital Archive – BBC Press Office – Issac Newton Group of Telescopes News Letter – Issac Newton Group of Telescopes BBC's All Night Star Party from the INT! 23rd August 2003 and the BBC FOUR cosmology series Journeys in Time and Space. – Journeys in Time and Space, BBC iplayer
In 2006 he wrote and presented BBC Radio 4's cosmology series The Cosmic Hunters. Other documentaries he's written and presented for BBC Radio 4 include Save the Moon (2014) and For All Mankind (2012). – Save the Moon!, BBC Sounds – For All Mankind, BBC Sounds
Behind the camera he has written and directed more than 50 films for the BBC's classic science magazine show Tomorrow's World and was a producer and director on series six of Rough Science.
In 2004 he produced the BBC's two-part drama documentary Space Odyssey: Voyage to the Planets. He was the science consultant on the BBC's remakes of their science fiction cult classics A for Andromeda (2006) and The Quatermass Experiment (2005). He directed and produced on the feature documentary film In the Shadow of the Moon, which premiered at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival, where it won the World Cinema Audience Documentary Award. The film was released in the US and Europe during the autumn of 2007. – Christopher Riley III, IMDB
Riley directed on the spinoff six-part series Moon Machines for the Discovery Channel in 2008, which celebrated the 400,000 engineers who'd made the Moonshots possible. The series aired in the US and the UK in June that year. – Christopher Riley III, IMDB
During the making of In the Shadow of the Moon, Riley rediscovered the only surviving 35mm print of the complete version of NASA's original Apollo 11 documentary film Moonwalk One which had been stored under the film's director Theo Kamecke's desk since it was made. With NASA's blessing, the pair worked to restore and remaster the feature film and re-released it in time for the 40th anniversary of the flight of Apollo 11 in July 2009. – The moon shoot: film of Apollo mission on show again after 35 years in the can, Guardian
At the Cheltenham Science Festival in 2009 he presented research conducted with forensic linguist John Olsson on the recordings of Neil Armstrong's first words spoken on the surface of the Moon in July 1969. Their study confirmed that the "a" was missing – contradicting previous conclusions presented by Peter Shann Ford in 2006. – An analysis of the recording of Armstrong's statement on stepping on the Moon in July 1969 Olsson and Riley went on to show that the words were spoken spontaneously and were not rehearsed or composed by some 'wordsmith' beforehand as many have speculated they might have been. – Armstrong's 'poetic' slip on Moon, BBC News
In 2011 Riley teamed up with the European Space Agency and Italian astronaut Paolo Nespoli to make the feature-length documentary First Orbit which re-created Yuri Gagarin's pioneering spaceflight Vostok 1. The film was recorded by matching the orbit of the International Space Station to the ground path of Vostok 1, and released for free to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the pioneering human space flight. – Movie recreates Gagarin's spaceflight, BBC News
He produced Kevin Fong's 2011 portrait of the Space Shuttle for BBC Two and Produced and Directed a 2012 film presented by Dallas Campbell which celebrated thirty-five years of NASA's Voyager Program for BBC Four. The same year Riley collaborated with Neil Armstrong's family to produce and direct the biopic First Man on the Moon, which premiered on BBC Two at the end of 2012 and on PBS Nova in December 2014. The film included interviews with Armstrong's sister June, brother Dean, and childhood friend Kocho Solacoff. – Neil Armstrong: First Man on the Moon (2012 TV Movie) Full Cast & Crew, IMDB
In 2013 Riley produced and directed a biopic of Nobel Prize–winning physicist Richard Feynman for the BBC. The Fantastic Mr Feynman aired on BBC Two in May that year, in time for what would have been Feynman's 95th birthday. – The Fantastic Mr Feynman, BBC TWO It was the first biographical film about Feynman which the BBC had commissioned since Christopher Sykes' groundbreaking documentaries in the early 1980s. The film includes interviews with his son Carl, his daughter Michelle and his sister, physicist Joan Feynman who Riley subsequently wrote a short biography about. – Joan Feynman: From auroras to anthropology
In 2014 he produced and directed a documentary about American neuroscientist John Lilly's controversial 1960s attempts to build an interspecies communications bridge between humans and dolphins. The film included the only onscreen interview recorded with the female researcher at the centre of the work - Margaret Howe Lovatt, who had reportedly developed a close relationship with one of the animals. The resulting film, The Girl who talked to Dolphins, premiered at the 2014 Sheffield International Documentary Festival and received widespread five star reviews; The Telegraph noting that "the anti-sensationalist approach of Riley's superb documentary was its trump card." – The Girl Who Talked to Dolphins - review The film was nominated for both a BAFTA and an RTS award the same year and for a Grierson award in 2015. – BAFTA Awards database – Realscreen – ANNOUNCING THE WINNERS OF GRIERSON 2015: The 43rd British Documentary Awards
In 2015 it was announced that Riley would direct a new film on the Hubble Space Telescope for National Geographic Channels. – National Geographic Channels announces film director Christopher Riley for Hubble The resulting documentary Hubble's Cosmic Journey included contributions from cosmologist Stephen Hawking, astrophysicist Ed Weiler and Charlie Pellerin, US Senator Barbara Mikulski and astronauts Story Musgrave, Charlie Bolden and John Grunsfeld. It premiered at National Geographic's Washington headquarters on 14 April 2015 - National Geographic Channel and NASA to Celebrate the 25th Anniversary of the Hubble Space Telescope at the World Premiere of NGC's Hubble's Cosmic Journey and received its network premiere in 171 countries the following week. The film is narrated by astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, and was nominated for an Emmy in 2015. - Emmy Award Nominations 2015 full list
In October 2015 Riley's long-awaited feature documentary The Fear of 13 received its world premiere at the BFI London Film Festival where it was nominated for Best Documentary. - 59th BFI London Film Festival Announces Juries for First Feature Competition, Documentary Competition and Short Film Award The film tells the life story of death row prisoner Nicholas Yarris, and took Riley over seven years to make, working without funding for the project for much of that time. - The Fear of 13 - the film producer's unbreakable promise The title refers to triskaidekaphobia, the fear of the number 13, just one of the many words learned by prisoner Nick Yarris while absorbing thousands of books during his 20-year stay on Death Row in a Pennsylvania prison. - The Hollywood News - The Fear of 13 review: "A gripping documentary feature" It was received well by the critics scoring 92% on the review-aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes. The film received its network premiere on the BBC's Storyville series on 31 January 2016, and was picked up by Netflix across the rest of the world. – The Fear of 13 - The Film Producer's Unbreakable Promise, Response Source In 2024 it was announced that actor Adrien Brody would play Yarris in a play adapted from the film by Lindsey Ferrentino and directed by Justin Martin at the Donmar Warehouse in London. – The Guardian - Adrien Brody to make London stage debut as man who spent 22 years on death row In 2025 the production was nominated for an Olivier Award for best new play, with Brody nominated for best leading actor. In March 2026 the play will open on Broadway with Brody again playing the lead role. – New York Theatre Guide - Guide to 'The Fear of 13' on Broadway starring Adrien Brody and Tessa Thompson
Riley collaborated with astronaut Paolo Nespoli for a second time in 2016–2017 to work on National Geographic's series One Strange Rock, with Paolo filming on board the International Space Station for the final episode 'Home' during Expedition 52 which featured astronaut Peggy Whitson's last NASA mission. Riley directed across the series and wrote and directed the episode 'Survival' featuring astronaut Jerry Linenger. The series is hosted by actor Will Smith - Variety - Will Smith Nat Geo event series One Strange Rock.
In September 2023 it was announced that Riley was co-writing The Moonwalkers with actor Tom Hanks, for the Lightroom, an immersive venue in London. - 'Lightroom - The Moonwalkers: A Journey With Tom Hanks'. - Time Out 'Tom Hanks is narrating a spectacular space-themed immersive experience in London'. - Evening Standard 'Apollo Missions experience opening in London in December'. The show premiered on the 6th of December 2023. - 'The Moonwalkers: A Journey with Tom Hanks, Lightroom review - a thrill ride into the wonder of space'. - 'The Moonwalkers'. The Moonwalkers opened in a purpose-built venue in South Korea the following year, - 'Live Design Online' - 'The Moonwalkers - Lighroom's brand new immersive experience' and in a modified form for an Imax screen at Space Centre Houston in February 2025. - 'Collect Space' - 'Tom Hanks' 'The Moonwalkers' premieres at Space Center Houston' A touring version of the show, through partner Culturespace, opened at Atelier des Lumières in Paris as "Destination Lune" in September 2025 - 'France24' - 'The Moonwalkers - a journey with Tom Hanks' and in Amsterdam in November of that year - 'Secret Amsterdam' - 'Let Tom Hanks Guide You To The Stars In Amsterdam’s New Immersive Space Exhibition' and in Manchester UK in December. - 'BBC News' - 'The Moonwalkers with Tom Hanks comes to Manchester' Within the first two years the show had played globally to over 700,000 people - 'Front View Magazine' - 'Lightroom announces exclusive Moonwalkers ticket offer as NASA lunar mission Artemis II prepares for launch'
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