TV Column: THE YORKSHIRE RIPPER FILES

This column was originally published in The Courier on 23rd March 2019.

https://www.thecourier.co.uk/category/lifestyle/entertainment/tv-film/

NEXT WEEK’S TV

THE YORKSHIRE RIPPER FILES: A VERY BRITISH CRIME STORY

Tuesday to Thursday, BBC Four, 9pm

When serial killer Peter Sutcliffe was finally caught in 1981, he had murdered 13 women and attacked at least eight more. His arrest was the result of Britain’s biggest ever manhunt. During that six-year investigation Sutcliffe was interviewed by the police on nine occasions, but was allowed to walk away each time. In this grimly absorbing three-part documentary, filmmaker Liza Williams meets survivors of Sutcliffe’s attacks, as well as relatives of other victims. She also interviews police officers, pathologists and journalists who covered this horrific case in an attempt to answer a disturbing question: did bigoted societal attitudes towards women, particularly within the male-dominated police force, allow Sutcliffe to continue killing long after he could have been caught?

MARS UNCOVERED: ANCIENT GOD OF WAR

Monday, BBC Four, 9pm

Historian Bettany Hughes examines the relationship between warfare and worship in this thought-provoking documentary. The notion of Holy War has endured throughout the centuries, basically all because of the titular warmongering deity. Hughes follows Mars in his many incarnations across a bloody battlefield of crusades, massacres and world wars. “Is Mars immortal because war is always going to be an essential part of our lives?” she asks. She also explains that, for the Romans, “he was a vital force in their drive to win and exploit an Empire.” However, they stole him from the Greeks, whose own God of war, Aries, was “distrusted and reviled.” That saga would be Python-esque if it didn’t have such catastrophic far-reaching consequences.

THE ROAD TO BREXIT

Tuesday, BBC Two, 10pm

Matt Berry reunites with his Toast of London co-writer Arthur Mathews for this almost mystifyingly unfunny spoof documentary. Mathews also co-created Father Ted, so he should know his way around a good whimsical joke. It appears his powers have deserted him. Berry plays political scholar Michael Squeamish – the same rich and fruity character he always plays, but with a different name. He takes us on a journey through the history of Britain’s relationship with Europe via the familiar comic device of placing archive footage out of context while adding fake captions and dubbed audio. That approach can sometimes work wonders – e.g. the work of comedian Rhys Thomas – but Berry and Mathews’ efforts are fatally hackneyed and thin.

THE BEATLES: MADE ON MERSEYSIDE

Friday, BBC Four, 9pm

Do we really need another documentary about the most scrupulously analysed pop group of all time? Certainly not on the evidence of this harmless yet inessential trawl through their well-worn origin story. It does contain a smattering of unfamiliar nuggets – if the Beatles hadn’t taken off, Paul would’ve become a window dresser – but for the most part it plays out like an instructional video for people who’ve inexplicably never heard any of this stuff before. Nevertheless, it occasionally benefits from the inclusion of an array of greying talking heads who actually knew the group before they were famous (the luckless Pete Best among them). It also features contributions from esteemed music journalist Jon Savage and an inevitable Paul Gambaccini.

LAST WEEK’S TV

MOTHERFATHERSON

Wednesday 20^th, BBC Two

Hollywood legend Richard Gere earned every penny of his paycheque in the latest episode of this enjoyably overwrought melodrama. He spent half of it wandering around sunny Mexico City while the main storyline unfolded elsewhere. Sweet gig. The most interesting aspect of MotherFatherSon by far is the relationship between Kathryn and her severely brain-damaged son. Helen McCrory and Billy Howle pour themselves into their respective roles. It’s such a muddled, overreaching drama, Howards’ Way chairing a Leveson Inquiry comprised of The Godfather, All the President’s Men and The Wolf of Wall Street, but I can’t quite tear myself away.

Lest we forget... LEN GOODMAN'S PARTNERS IN RHYME

LEN GOODMAN’S PARTNERS IN RHYME: Saturday, BBC One

THE STATE: Sunday to Thursday, Channel 4

I was saddened by the death of Bruce Forsyth recently. He was one of the greatest front-of-cloth talents in British television history, the hoofing embodiment of light entertainment itself.

But I’m glad he didn’t hang around long enough to witness LEN GOODMAN’S PARTNERS IN RHYME, an atrocious new Saturday night game show in which his erstwhile Strictly colleague soiled the genre that Brucie helped to build.

Len’s corny rhymes are a popular, if minor, part of the winningStrictly formula. Basing an entire show around them is clearly a terrible idea, but that hasn’t stopped Radio 1 DJ Matt Edmondson, who devised this drivel, from doing just that.

The word ‘surreal’ is often misused, but how else to describe such an utterly bewildering misfire?

It announces its awfulness immediately. The opening theme song is a lethargic, unsettling rap from Len. It sounds like Hooky Streetfrom Only Fools and Horses at half speed, the sort of sonic horror they tortured prisoners with in Guantanamo Bay.

It was followed by an introductory monologue delivered entirely in rhyme, in which Len claimed to have shared champagne with a Great Dane and a stew with a Shiatsu.

He then performed an awkward ‘street dance’ with a black contestant before introducing a team of celebrity helpers including his old Strictly china Anton du Beke and Big Mo from EastEnders.

The contestants are shown a series of absurd images and have to guess the correct rhyme. It’s Catchphrase for idiots. These rhymes include: Anton Du Beke with a really long neck; a scotch egg with a broken leg; Jack Whitehall on a wrecking ball. Those are some of the better ones.

There’s also a Give Us a Clue-style round in which the celebs mime a rhyme (Tom Cruise looking for clues; Mel and Sue cleaning the loo etc.). At one point, ‘90s relic Mr Motivator turned up for no discernible reason.

The jaw-dropping weirdness is compounded by an unseen studio audience who are audio-mixed so thinly and distantly they sound like they’re responding sarcastically from another dimension.

This is the sort of show that people will dimly recall in years to come while questioning whether it ever actually existed. Even while watching it unspool in front of you, it still doesn’t feel real. Naturally, it’s already been commissioned for a second series.

I am, broadly speaking, a staunch defender of the BBC, but they don’t half make life difficult sometimes.

Len Goodman is an affable soul, but he’s no Bruce Forsyth. Brucie was such a gifted host, he could transform even the most unpromising format into entertaining TV gold. He wouldn’t have touched this garbage with a 50-foot bargepole.

TV Column: LEAVING NEVERLAND: MICHAEL JACKSON AND ME + DERRY GIRLS

This article was originally published in The Courier on 9th March 2019.

https://www.thecourier.co.uk/category/lifestyle/entertainment/tv-film/

NEXT WEEK’S TV

CHEAT

Monday to Thursday, STV, 9pm

Deep within the bowels of ITV Towers is an airless chamber where contracted writers are forced to churn out pot-boiling thrillers starring familiar faces. Cheat is the latest product of this heinous abuse of human rights. Katherine Kelly (Coronation Street) plays an upmarket university lecturer whose life comes a cropper when a ruthlessly ambitious student (Molly Windsor from Three Girls, who deserves better) mounts a weird campaign against her. Cards on the table, folks, we dedicated members of the press were only given preview access to episode one – Cheat is generously stripped throughout the week - but I think it’s fair to predict that this Richard & Judy Book Club folderol won’t improve after such a risible opening chapter.

                                                                                                     

24 HOURS IN POLICE CUSTODY

Monday, Channel 4, 9pm

The acceptable face of cop-trailing crime documentaries, this sombre hardy perennial works because it swaps the genre’s usual tabloid sensationalism for a more socially responsible and detailed approach. The latest series begins with an extended edition in which police officers search for a dangerous predator who sexually assaulted a woman at knife-point during broad daylight. The rapist was unknown to his victim – statistically, a fairly rare occurrence – and his DNA wasn’t stored on the police’s extensive nationwide database of known sex offenders. As always, the programme follows the investigation from its initial stages to the eventual, claustrophobic interrogation of a chief suspect. It provides some valuable, sensitive insight into how severe cases such as this are handled.

AUSTRALIA: EARTH’S MAGICAL KINGDOM

Friday, BBC Two, 9pm

It may boast all the panoramic and granular pleasures you’ve come to expect from world-beating natural history documentaries, but by far the most satisfying aspect of this new series is its unlikely yet entirely apt choice of narrator. The great Barry Humphries is a much loved and highly respected Australian superstar, but he doesn’t usually lend his dulcet tones to programmes of this nature. It’s rather wonderful listening to him enthuse about colourful species of wildlife about which little is widely known. He begins by revealing how animals have learned to adapt across Australia’s dramatically disparate weather extremes. Star turns include a platypus cousin who can lower its body temperature to endure icy winters, and some remarkably intelligent cockatoos.

SHOWBANDS: HOW IRELAND LEARNT TO PARTY

Friday, BBC Four, 9pm

Ardal O’Hanlon is your warm, witty guide to the history of a uniquely Irish showbiz phenomenon. From the 1950s to the end of the 1970s, hundreds of showbands – “versatile, hardworking mobile jukeboxes in shiny suits” – freely crisscrossed the north and south of Ireland. Many of them became household names. The showbands saw themselves purely as entertainers, but they transformed the lives of young people living in rural backwaters, triggered a kind of social revolution in the dancehalls and broke down religious and political barriers. O’Hanlon finds out what their success said about Ireland during a tumultuous era of cultural isolationism and bitter sectarian violence. As the tragic fate of the Miami Showband illustrates, they weren’t always immune to their surroundings.

LAST WEEK’S TV

JERK

Monday 4^th, BBC One

Tim Renkow is the star and co-creator of this charmless comedy in which he plays an American slacker with cerebral palsy who happily exploits his condition to secure a Visa. The sole joke is that Tim is a chaos-causing prankster who gets away with being endlessly rude to awkwardly well-meaning able-bodied idiots. No one wants to offend him. It’s supposed to be a challenging satirical comment on ridiculous social attitudes surrounding disability, but it’s neither funny nor clever enough to pull that off. Renkow’s character is a smug irritant. That wouldn’t matter if he was an entertaining smug irritant, but Jerk is utterly tiresome and routine.

DERRY GIRLS

Tuesday 5^th, Channel 4

This delightful sitcom about an awkward gang of Northern Irish teenagers growing up in the Troubled 1990s was a big sleeper hit when it debuted last year. Comedy shows can sometimes lose focus and start playing to the gallery when unexpectedly showered with praise, but there was no sign of that curse as series two began. By sending her girls (and boy) on a ‘Friends Across the Barricade’ weekend aimed at bringing Catholic and Protestant kids together, writer Lisa McGee managed to mock the lunacy of religious prejudice without a hint of self-righteousness. It was another gag-packed, acutely-observed episode, beautifully played as always by a faultless cast. 

LEAVING NEVERLAND: MICHAEL JACKSON AND ME

Wednesday 6^th and Thursday 7^th, Channel 4

Jackson evaded justice during his lifetime, but this gut-punching documentary held him to unequivocal account. It focused on Wade Robson and James Safechuck, both of whom allege they were sexually abused by their childhood idol over a period of several years. Their relentlessly graphic and entirely credible testimonies were juxtaposed with recollections from their mothers attempting to explain how they were hoodwinked. As their stories unfolded like a horrifying family scrapbook, a consistent portrait emerged of Jackson as a devious predatory paedophile who exploited his status and innocent man-child image to groom children and their parents. He destroyed lives. Jackson’s legacy won’t recover from this damning expose. It can’t.

TRAVELLING BLIND

Thursday 7^th, BBC Two

Amar Latif has been blind since he was eighteen, but that hasn’t stopped him from travelling the world in search of adventure. All he needs is a sighted person to act as a guide. His assistant during this bright and breezy Turkey travelogue was comedian Sara Pascoe, lest anyone avoid an educational programme informed by disability due to an unacceptable lack of celebrity involvement. To be fair, it did achieve Latif’s goal of illustrating that blindness isn’t a barrier to enjoying a rich and fulfilling life. A decent introduction to the BBC’s new Crossing Divides season, which explores how people can be brought together in this fragmented world of ours.

TV Column: THE REAL MARIGOLD ON TOUR + DAVID BOWIE: FINDING FAME

This article was originally published in The Courier on 16th February 2019.

https://www.thecourier.co.uk/category/lifestyle/entertainment/tv-film/

NEXT WEEK’S TV

THE REAL MARIGOLD ON TOUR

Wednesday, BBC One, 9pm

The ageing dream team of twinkly Paul Nicholas, rambunctious Sheila Ferguson, cheeky Wayne Sleep and that nice Jan Leeming (mercifully, there’s no sign of tiresome professional eccentric Miriam Margolyes) pitch up in wintry yet passion-fuelled Argentina this week, where they take late-night Tango lessons, explore local art and music, visit a university offering a range of stimulating classes for senior citizens, and – perhaps inevitably - sing Don’t Cry for Me Argentina beneath the balcony where Eva Peron delivered her famous speech. Five-times-married Jan has been single for fifteen years, so it’s rather charming when a man she meets at her life drawing class invites her out on a date. Alas, it ends up being quite awkward.

JAMES MARTIN’S GREAT BRITISH ADVENTURE

Monday, STV, 2pm

This afternoon retreat starring the top TV chef and Richard Herring lookalike trundles along merrily throughout the week. The latest gentle barrage begins with a Lancashire trek in the company of Michelin-starred chef and Great British Menu titan, Lisa Allen. She’s the cheerfully subdued yin to his borderline manic yang. Whenever he enthuses about “great tucker”, he looks like he’s about to burst through the screen and shove some fennel in your face. As a Mini lurks conspicuously in the background – these shows always have to include a classic car of some description – they cook up some savoury fish, bake Eccles cakes, chow down on freshly farm-milked buffalo cheese and, inevitably, provide a recipe for the ultimate Lancashire hotpot.

MARTIN CLUNES: ISLANDS OF AMERICA

Tuesday, STV, 9pm

If we must have celebrity-fronted travelogues on TV, then they may as well be fronted by the affable Clunes. At least this one goes slightly off the beaten track to explore parts of America that haven’t been overexposed. The latest leg of his empathetic journey takes him to America’s only Spanish-speaking island, Puerto Rico, as well as the Sea Islands along the coasts of Georgia and the Carolinas. There he meets members of the Gullah Geechee people, descendants of the African slaves who once toiled on local plantations. A prominent spokeswoman explains how they proudly celebrate their cultural identity – which includes its own language - while educating others about their history and sadly dwindling way of life.

MONTY DON’S JAPANESE GARDENS

Friday, BBC Two, 9pm

The nation’s favourite curly-haired horticulturalist is on a mission to unearth the culture that lies behind some of the world’s most beautiful gardens. His final scenic pit-stop takes place in a crisply red-leaved autumn, where he finds out how one of Japan’s greatest public gardens is looked after in preparation for the harshness of winter. He also continues to trace the colourful history of these idyllic beauty spots. It’s a consummately comforting hour of artisan relax-o-vision. It would, of course, be remiss of me to end any Don-based critique without reminding you that the Montydon is my favourite herbivore dinosaur by far. You can have that one for free, I’m here all week etc.

LAST WEEK’S TV

DAVID BOWIE: FINDING FAME

Saturday 9^th, BBC Two

The final part of director Francis Whately’s highly acclaimed trilogy of feature-length documentaries about the Dame traced the fascinating saga of how struggling musician David Jones eventually metamorphosed into a pansexual alien rock superstar. Like Whatley’s previous films, it was an impressively researched, artfully compiled essay that benefitted from a sharp focus on a specific period of Bowie’s life and career. Courtesy of incisive contributions from various collaborators, friends, relatives and lovers, a portrait emerged of a bright, sensitive, talented and tenacious artist gradually finding his voice and refusing to be ground down by a string of failed bands and flop records. He somehow knew he was destined for greatness.

THE MAKING OF ME

Monday 11^th, Channel 4

Filmed over three years, this welcome new series follows nine transgender people as they go through the process of transitioning. It also featured contributions from partners and family members. In the happy case of Cairo, a transgender man, they were fully supportive. However, he expressed his frustration about being mis-gendered in public. Vicky, a transgender woman, has joint custody of her children, who took the situation in their stride. The only vaguely wobbly story in this otherwise positive portrayal involved 56-year-old Jackie, a transgender woman, and her wife Julie. The latter, while broadly supportive, admitted that she sometimes missed her husband. Thankfully, they made it work and renewed their wedding vows.

SHETLAND

Tuesday 12^th, BBC One

Series five of this hit crime drama began with the discovery of dismembered body parts washed up on the shore. Yes, it was grisly business as usual for clue-sniffing copper DI Jimmy Perez (Douglas Henshall), as he set about unpicking a tangled web of organised crime. The victim? A young Nigerian man. I find it all but impossible to concentrate on whatever appears to be going on in this pot-boiling murder mulch, as I’m constantly distracted by the quotidian dialogue and wooden acting from practically every member of the cast, Henshall included. It’s like watching a bunch of fence posts slowly eroding in the bitter northeast rain.

FLAT PACK POP: SWEDEN’S MUSIC MIRACLE

Friday 15^th, BBC Four

Did you know that the slick sound of modern pop was largely crafted by anonymous Swedish songwriters and producers? Yes, you probably did, as it’s a well-known fact, so the supposedly lid-lifting premise of this documentary fell flat. It also neglected to mention that, in the 1960s, Phil Spector and the team behind the Monkees operated along the same model as these obsessive backroom boffins: they didn’t invent the concept of formulaic yet irresistible perfect pop. Nevertheless, music journalist James Ballardie still managed to present a fairly interesting ‘secret history’ of how some modest Scandinavians created a distinctive melodic/robotic R&B sound in the 1990s that still resonates today.

TV Column: STORYVILLE: UNDER THE WIRE

This article was originally published in The Courier on 9th February 2019.

https://www.thecourier.co.uk/category/lifestyle/entertainment/tv-film/

THIS WEEK’S TV

STORYVILLE: UNDER THE WIRE

Monday, BBC Four, 10pm

Marie Colvin was one of the greatest war correspondents of her generation. While covering dangerous conflicts in the likes of Afghanistan and Iraq, she focused on the lives of ordinary civilians caught in the crossfire. In this gripping documentary, her photographer Paul Conroy, with whom she formed a close friendship and hugely productive professional relationship, pays tribute to “a complete and utter one-off”. Colvin and Conroy were the only British newspaper journalists on the ground in the besieged district of Baba Amr during the Syrian Uprising of 2012, when Assad’s merciless regime massacred their own people. It’s a powerful and at times harrowing paean to real journalism, a vital public service personified by Colvin’s dedication, bravery, passion and integrity.

THE SECRET LIFE OF SLIM PEOPLE

Monday, Channel 4, 8:30pm

The only people who benefit from Britain’s obesity crisis are fast food manufacturers and the C4 producers who churn out programmes based on the subject. But wait, this one has a twist: how come so many people struggle with their weight while others remain slim while eating rubbish and doing what they like? Rinia and Hayley don’t eat healthily and never exercise, but they’re both technically underweight. Cameras are installed in their homes for a week to monitor their diets, while medical experts attempt to come up with an explanation for their fat-free resilience. Warning: if you’re concerned about your weight, then watching petite humans devouring cheese, chocolate, crisps and double cream won’t make you feel any better.

A VERY BRITISH HISTORY

Monday, BBC Four, 9pm

This enlightening new series examines key 20^th century moments for minority communities in Britain. Hosted by figures from those communities, it begins with writer Damian Le Bas harking back to the 1960s to show how societal pressures, prejudices and government legislations gradually forced Romany people to abandon their nomadic way of life. Aided by fascinating archive footage and contributions from older members of Le Bas’ extended family, it depicts 21^st century Romany people proudly celebrating their heritage and tacitly functions as a refreshing antidote to the mocking tone of the mercifully defunct Big Fat Gypsy franchise. It also unearths the little-known story of how romantic novelist Dame Barbara Cartland found a permanent home for ostracised travellers in Hertfordshire.

SKINT BRITAIN: FRIENDS WITHOUT BENEFITS

Wednesday, Channel 4, 9pm

It’s been five years since C4 unleashed the controversial Benefits Street. This sympathetic documentary series almost feels like a belated apology (it's produced by the same person). Angry and angering, it follows unemployed residents of Hartlepool as they barely cope to survive with the introduction of Universal Credit, an inhuman piece of legislation that makes it harder for people to live on benefits than ever before. Utter chaos ensues. A young man is reduced to hunting for rabbits and squirrels to cook, a desperate cancer patient gets lost within a bureaucratic maelstrom actively opposed to helping those most in need, and a partially blind man practically begs for help. It’s a frank and sickening expose of the worst extremes of sociopathic Tory ideology. Do not miss.

LAST WEEK’S TV

MAYANS M.C.

Saturday 2^nd, BBC Two

This spin-off from the hit American crime drama Sons of Anarchy revolves around a drug-running Mexican biker gang based in a fictional California border town. The protagonist is an intelligent and secretly sensitive young beefcake who’s struggling to cope with a violent lifestyle he never intended to adopt. It’s hip, stylish and boasts a great soundtrack, but those cosmetic details only serve to highlight a nagging lack of depth and pace. The characters and storyline aren’t exactly compelling, it feels like we’ve been here a billion times before. Sons of Anarchy fans might welcome this expansion of its universe, but it’s a slog for the uninitiated.

AFRICA WITH ADE ADEPITAN

Sunday 3^rd, BBC Two

The ebullient wheelchair basketball player began his informative journey around Africa – “the most exciting continent on the planet” – with visits to Cape Verde, Senegal, Ivory Coast and Nigeria (where Adepitan was born). Celebrity-fronted travelogues are often bland affairs, but this one digs beneath the sunny scenery to expose a bleak trail of tragic, brutal history and worrying present-day problems. Adepitan met fishing-reliant communities almost entirely descended from slaves and their European masters. These impoverished, hardworking people are still having their resources stolen by foreign interlopers. As one despairing fisherman put it, “There’s another kind of slavery now.” Adepitan also met Nigerians scarred by civil war. A commendably thoughtful series.

THE DEFIANT ONES

Friday 8^th, BBC Four

When legendary producers/moguls Dr Dre and Jimmy Iovine sold Beats Electronic to Apple for $3 billion in 2014, it was one of the biggest deals in music history. Fast-paced, witty and irreverent, this documentary miniseries traces the unusual story of two men from working-class backgrounds, one African-American, the other Italian-American, rising up the ranks and eventually coming together to form a powerful alliance. The dynamic duo have some of the biggest names in the business on speed-dial, hence the presence of talking heads such as Snoop Dogg, Bruce Springsteen, Bono and Eminem. Interesting stuff, but I’m not sure it deserves to be stretched over six episodes.

TV Column: TEACHERS TRAINING TO KILL

This article was originally published in The Courier on 2nd February 2019.

https://www.thecourier.co.uk/category/lifestyle/entertainment/tv-film/

NEXT WEEK’S TV

TEACHERS TRAINING TO KILL

Monday, Channel 4, 9pm

At a remote summer camp in Ohio, schoolteachers are being trained to use firearms. Blatantly endorsed by Trump, it’s a radical response to the never-ending spate of tragic school shootings. Prepare to despair at this powerful documentary in which an arrogant county sheriff mounts a controversial campaign to fight fire with fire. Naturally, it never occurs to this agenda-pushing fanatic that an unequivocal reformation of the outdated Second Amendment is a simpler solution. Disturbing attack simulations involving students dressed with fake wounds are juxtaposed with intelligent contributions from a teenager who survived a school shooting. As he observes, what if an armed teacher becomes violently, mentally ill? It’s almost as if the pro-gun lobby doesn’t actually care.

HOW THE OTHER KIDS LIVE

Tuesday, Channel 4, 8pm

Imagine a benign version of Wife Swap starring innocent ankle-biters instead of bickering adults, and you’ve basically got the measure of this new social experiment starring children who live just streets apart but who come from different worlds. When they visit each other for playdates that would never otherwise happen, they learn about different cultures and backgrounds. The series begins with Catholic Brendan, Muslim Yasmin and privately educated twins Tom, who has Down’s syndrome, and Billy. The kids are bright and sweet, their parents are lovely, and the whole thing amounts to a touching celebration of open-mindedness. Brendan sums it up: “Houses don’t really matter what they look like, it’s just a house. It’s not [for] you to judge it.”

THE SECRET LIFE OF THE ZOO

Thursday, Channel 4, 8pm

Whether you approve of zoos or not, there’s no denying that the staff at Chester Zoo – the setting for the latest series of this fly-on-the-wall perennial – are dedicated to looking after various endangered species. The focus this week is on the relationships that form between animals during conservation projects. We witness the bittersweet tale of a pair of giant otter pals who, because they’ve never mated, have to be separated to make way for another male, and a domestic dispute between two Andean bears: the clingy teenage daughter doesn’t understand why her antsy mother wants more space to herself. The programme also features some drunk South American butterflies, which isn’t a phrase I ever thought I’d find myself writing.

JEREMY WADE’S MIGHTY RIVERS

Friday, STV, 8pm

In the final episode of his grave ecological travelogue, the snow-haired biologist and extreme angler reveals that even the mighty Zambezi is in trouble. Massive construction projects and overfishing are threatening its health. Wade discovers that parts of the Zambezi delta have dried up due to a lack of flooding caused by a massive Zimbabwean hydro-dam. His canoe-based investigation involves some hairy encounters with a man-eating crocodile and some angry hippos, and a chat with a local fisherman who predicts that soon all the fish will be gone. Fairly interesting stuff, but it’s docked a point for carelessly neglecting to use Marlena Shaw’s recording of the gospel-soul classic Wade in the Water as its theme tune.

LAST WEEK’S TV

IMAGINE… JO BRAND: NO HOLDS BARRED

Monday 28^th, BBC One

When Jo Brand first arrived on the ‘80s alternative comedy scene, her uncompromisingly deadpan stage persona was refreshing and deliberately provocative: a revolutionary pioneer in the then barren field of female stand-up. These days, of course, she’s renowned as one of the nicest people in showbiz, but that doesn’t mean she’s lost her edge. Far from it. This candid profile paid tribute to her prodigious talent. Understandably, she bristled at the ‘national treasure’ tag. Have you seen her autobiographical sitcoms Damned and the shamefully underrated Getting On? They’re angry, compassionate, intelligent products of a subversively politicised, anti-establishment philosophy. History will judge her with the kindness and respect she deserves.

THE STAND UP SKETCH SHOW

Monday 28^th, ITV2

TV producers sometimes cough up concepts so catastrophically ill-conceived, you almost have to marvel at their cluelessness. This series is aimed at an imaginary audience who can’t engage with stand-up comedy routines unless they’re accompanied by sketches spelling out the contents in overliteral detail. Sketches can certainly be used to elaborate upon ideas explored in stand-up routines – e.g. Dave Allen and Stewart Lee – but listening to a comic talk while a sketch unfolds just kills the jokes stone dead. Not that the bland, hacky observational comics employed by the show – Seann ‘love rat’ Walsh included – are funny anyway, but they stand even less of a chance in this context.

PURE

Wednesday 30^th, Channel 4

Marnie is young Scottish woman who, since the age of 14, has been plagued by relentlessly graphic thoughts about sex: “It’s like The Sixth Sense, but I don’t see dead people. I see naked ones.” In episode one of this instantly arresting comedy drama, Marnie fled to London on a desperate voyage of self-discovery after a disastrous speech at her parents’ wedding anniversary, during which she imagined everyone in the room indulging in all sorts of publicly prohibited activities. Based on a true story, Pure is a funny, frank and liberating study of mental illness, and newcomer Charly Clive is hugely likeable as the captivatingly chaotic Marnie. A guaranteed cult hit.

TV Review: THE INTERROGATION OF TONY MARTIN + DAVID CASSIDY: THE LAST SESSION

This article was originally published in The Courier on 24 November 2018.

https://www.thecourier.co.uk/category/lifestyle/entertainment/tv-film/

THE INTERROGATION OF TONY MARTIN: Sunday, Channel 4

DAVID CASSIDY: THE LAST SESSION: Friday, BBC Four

On the night of 20 August 1999, farmer Tony Martin shot and killed teenage burglar Fred Barras. Martin always claimed he acted in self-defence, despite the intruder being unarmed. Martin shot Barras in the back. He eventually served three years of a life sentence, after the original murder charge was reduced to manslaughter.

This case became a political cause celebre. Right-wingers were generally supportive of Martin’s right to protect his property. People capable of more nuanced thought patterns were dismayed by the notion of a binary society in which violent vigilante justice is considered acceptable.

Was Tony Martin a victim? Of crime, certainly. Were his actions justified? Absolutely not. However, what do we really know about him? The claustrophobic factual drama, THE INTERROGATION OF TONY MARTIN, sought to reveal more about this infamous figure via verbatim transcripts of his police interviews.

Largely set within the confines of an interrogation room, it began on the day after the crime took place. Martin (a mesmerising performance from Steve Pemberton) initially came across as a lonely, frightened, confused and vulnerable man experiencing a waking nightmare. He seemed quite sympathetic.

One of Pemberton’s greatest gifts is his unerring ability to imbue ostensibly off-putting characters with traces of ambiguity and pathos.

Martin tried to explain his fearful personality – in the words of his mother, “My son is very highly strung and has a tendency to worry about things.” – by tentatively discussing the sexual abuse he’d suffered as a child. Since then he’d shut himself off from the world in a remote farmhouse shrouded in darkness.

He claimed he’d been burgled several times, but eventually stopped going to the police as he felt he wasn’t being taken seriously. He slept every night, fully clothed, with an illegally-owned shotgun under his bed.

As the drama progressed, my initial impression of Martin changed. His account of that night was vague and contradictory. He came across as arrogant and blasé. When the police eventually picked his slippery story apart, he seemed genuinely astonished that he’d been charged with murder.

To this day, he maintains that he did nothing wrong. How do we know this? The man himself appeared in a chilling coda, during which he returned to the farm for the first time in 19 years. Unrepentant, he said he’d do the same thing again without hesitation. Does he regret killing Barras? Not in the slightest. Tony Martin isn’t a well man. He needs help.

This discomfiting drama won’t have changed anyone’s mind about Martin’s crime, but it did deliver some insight into his damaged psyche.

A raw profile of a man nearing the end of his life, DAVID CASSIDY: THE LAST SESSION followed the reluctant teeny-bop idol as he struggled with dementia and other serious health issues.

With admirable candour, the frail Cassidy invited a documentary crew to record his struggles. He reflected on a life during which he battled with alcoholism for many years, while recording what would prove to be his final tracks - poignant pre-rock tributes to a troubled showbiz father with whom he had a strained relationship.

The programme also featured rare extracts from an in-depth audio interview he taped at the height of his fame in 1976. Even at that age, he came across as an intelligent and introspective man.

This was the tragic saga of a manufactured idol, a typecast fantasy construct, battling with the cruel vicissitudes of real life. It was terribly sad, but never voyeuristic or exploitative. A sensitive tribute.