ITV
Jasper Rees
There was something very postmodern about the resumption of Quentin Crisp’s story. To recap, in case you missed episode one back in 1975, The Naked Civil Servant has been turned into a successful television drama, and its subject into a celebrity. The script doesn’t go quite so far as to name the actor who impersonates Crisp, but here is John Hurt playing Quentin Crisp being interviewed on television the night after a drama is broadcast in which Quentin Crisp is played by John Hurt.Perhaps it was only a matter of time before Hurt returned to a role which, more than any other, crystallised his Read more ...
Jasper Rees
You can just picture the meeting. Someone stands up and pitches. “We’ve got this girl, see. And she’s good at numbers, OK? You know, maths and stuff. But here’s the thing: she knows that statistically her best chance of a successful marriage is if she gets hitched to her 11th sexual partner when she’s 28. With me so far, guys? Trouble is, she discovers on her wedding day that Mister Eleven is really Mister Ten. Yeah? And then all hell breaks loose. What you reckon? Eh? Think it’s a goer?” Silence reigns in the room until the head honcho - you somehow assume it is a man - slowly raises his Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
The premise of Collision (as well as its title) is unmistakably similar to that of Paul Haggis's movie Crash, in which a road accident provides the linking point for a cluster of disparate personal stories. However, instead of the boulevards of Los Angeles, Collision exploits the less often remarked upon mystique of the A12, which links east London to Great Yarmouth. In 2007, the A12 was adjudged "Britain's worst road" in a survey by Cornhill lnsurance, so Collision's creator and writer Anthony Horowitz has picked an appropriate location for his fateful multi-vehicle pile-up.
The strands of Read more ...
Jasper Rees
You can only assume they decided to confront the, er, generously proportioned mammal in the room. ITV launches a new police procedural starring the star of an old police procedural. Said star is a sizeable Scot with an old Toby jug of a face and, oh sod it, let’s just admit we’ve cast him because of the baggage. Yes, Cracker is back. OK, not Cracker, nor even Fitz, but a lived-in Glaswegian high-rise of a man who cracks murder cases on primetime, pausing only for the commercial breaks. It’s almost as if the young witness already knows all about Robbie Coltrane. “I’ve seen you before,” she Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
They say you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone, and despite its sometimes erratic quality control, the loss of The South Bank Show (ITV1) is going to be like having a leg sawn off TV's arts coverage.The final season got off to a thunderous start last week with Tony Palmer’s film about the Wagner family. Wives, children and grandchildren elbowed each other aside in their eagerness to accuse each other of barbaric behaviour or rabid anti-Semitism. When Richard Wagner composed Parsifal, apparently he was creating nothing less than the complete blueprint for the Third Reich. Who knew? Read more ...
gerard.gilbert
Secondary school teachers accused of not pointing their brighter students towards Oxbridge might feel vindicated by ITV2’s Trinity - although the messages were a little mixed. On the one hand the fictional elitist university college in this new teen dramedy-thriller is dominated by sadistic, floppy-fringed toffs and their debauched secret societies. On the other hand some state-educated freshers might quite like the idea of being asked by lithe, blue-blooded blondes, “Have you ever come on a member of the royal family?”This unsubtle entreaty – addressed to Reggie Yates’s Lewisham lad Theo - Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
Miss Marple is frequently described as “a little old lady”, but for all that she casts a giant shadow. Just ask any new actress invited to portray this most beloved of characters. When you play the spinster sleuth, you have massive shoes to fill. That has certainly been Julia McKenzie’s experience.The 68-year-old this week appeared for the first time in the part of Agatha Christie’s much-loved amateur detective. She took over the role from Geraldine McEwan, who retired last year after starring in twelve episodes as Miss Marple. McKenzie admits to jangling nerves beforehand. She was well aware Read more ...