What we were watching this week 20 years ago, as recorded in the back-issues of TV Cream’s weekly ‘e-mag’, Creamguide…
(We still send out Creamguides every week via email. If you’d like to receive it – it’s free, there are no ads, we don’t sell on your address, you can unsubscribe whenever; we’re basically soppy like that – then fill in your details below.)
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TV CREAM TIMES
19th – 25th October 2002
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10 PRINT “Graham Kibble-White, Chris Diamond, Phil Norman”
20 GOTO 10
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Saturday 19th October
BBC1
08.05 Looney Tunes
Loads of these on BBC2 during the week between the programmes on CBBC’s holiday mornings. But since when have they done ‘holiday mornings’ for October half-term? Back in the day you didn’t even get them on May Day.
18.10 Only Fools and Horses
Incidentally, hello to everyone who’s been moved to subscribe to Creamguide thanks to the revolving quotes on the new TVC front page. We’d like to think we’re not as pedantic as they make us sound, but that’s a forlorn hope, really.
22.25 Parkinson
Our sincere apologies to anyone who watched this a few weeks back because we’d announced Peter Kay was appearing. He’s actually on tonight, and hopefully he’ll be as ‘manic’ as he was on Patrick Keilty the other week, walking into the audience and wondering aloud if the show was live, in the grand tradition of all the best Creamy comics. Better still, he’s joined by Sir Bob of Monkhouse, but alas the other guest is the sixties nostalgia act Lulu.
23.25 Witness
Harrison Ford gets milking in this often-scheduled Amish thriller, which allows us once again to ponder exactly how Kelly McGillis, here still in the ascendent, managed to lose it so spectacularly by the end of the decade. Likewise that other ’80s Kelly, LeBrock, who was all over the media (not to mention Wogan) after The Woman in Red, but has spent her post-Weird Science career in such non-fare as Hard Bounty, delivering lines like “There’s only two things I can’t do – one is make love to a woman, the other is piss up a wall.” Edifying. Then there’s Emily ‘Trigger’s daughter’ Lloyd, Tatum O’Neal, all the Coreys, and any number of Brat Packers, although we won’t hear a word said against Ally Sheedy. Barry Newman (Vanishing Point, Petrocelli, er… King Crab) and, naturally, Mickey ‘from Diner to Get Carter 2000’ Rourke, pretty much fit the exponential career dive graph, as did Rita ‘Knack’ Tushingham the day she set foot on the set of Bread. Sally Field faltered at the post-Smokey and the Bandit fence, as did pretty much everyone namechecked in the Fall Guy theme song, apart from Cheryl Tiegs who was never a star in the first place. Saddest of all, two Cream legends, Patrick ‘Babe, Secret of the Lost Legend’ McGoohan and Malcolm ‘Biker Mice from Mars’ McDowell, have had their post-’70s screen careers seriously clipped, while William Shatner continues to pack ’em in. Something’s wrong there.
BBC2
17.40 Porridge
Complementary scheduling on the BBC, as this finishes just in time for Only Fools on the other side.
18.10 The Bridge at Remagen
It must have been frustrating for the makers of this WWII Rhineland stand-off flick. There you are, with a good (and reasonably historically accurate) script, some fine prop and effects work, and George Segal and Robert Vaughan heading up the allied and axis teams respectively among a smart cast, and what do people remember your thoroughly decent film for, if at all? An unfortunate continuity error involving the same fat Nazi infantryman walking past in the background over and over again. Dickie Attenborough never had this trouble.
21.05 Fame, Set and Match
This is what we want, a history of breakfast TV! Someone could get a book out of this, y’know. Alright, it’s not exactly that – instead, as in each episode of this series, they pick five celebrities and follow their careers. Obviously in this case it means Frank Bough, hopefully relying on his Breakfast Book for information, a publication whose prose style suggests that Frank dictated it over the phone to someone who couldn’t be bothered transcribing it into full sentences (“1964. Grandstand. Forty-four shows a year. Studio E, Lime Grove.”). Also featured is Anne Diamond, a woman seemingly hated by everyone in the industry, Selina Scott, who of course went from Grampian Television to News at Ten, which would never happen now, Ulrika (zzzz) and, tenously, Jeremy ‘Today’s The Day’ Beadle. Ah well, should be fun.
ITV
01.35 Forever
“Ballads” is the theme, and Celine Dion is the only artist mentioned in the billing. If you’re not asleep by the time this starts, you soon will be.
CHANNEL 4
01.25 The Dead Zone
To be honest, if you wanted to make a horror film with Christopher Walken in, you could just sit him in a chair and have him look into the camera for 90 minutes, smiling occasionally. Anyway, David Cronenberg has him do a bit more in this version of Stephen King’s novel in which a young, bright, appy – and therfore damned – teacher is put into a coma for five years only to wake up and discover he’s psychic, apower no doubt exacerbated by having scary eyes. Not normally our cup of tea, but Herbert Lom’s in it, so we’ll be there
CHANNEL 5
17.15 Krull
“I am Ergo the Magnificent: short in stature, tall in power, narrow of purpose and wide of vision!” So sayeth the great David Battley in this tremendous Cream-ridden Britfest from 1983. Isn’t that Robbie Coltrane? Good lord! There’s Tucker! Liam Neeson? I can’t believe my eyes! Freddie Jones? Why, it’s Alun Armstrong an’ all…and there’s her from Three Up Two Down and The Terror Beneath Loch Ness! But wait…none of them are the star. Stand back and behold the mighty figure of Rell the Cyclops played by Bernard Bresslaw! If you see only one film about mysterious evil demi-gods coming from the stars and conquering a quasi-mediaevel world this week, make it this one. And as a bonus listen to David Battley’s finest 13 seconds by clicking here: http://www.badmovies.org/movies/krull/krull3.wav
05.10 Sons and Daughters
The World Series baseball is on before it, and the Moto GP is on after it – you’d think that C5 might actually point out it’s got some of this sport. Just the one episode today for that reason, but back to full-strength on Friday.
Sunday 20th October
BBC1
16.30 Points of View
A curious viewer asks how come the BBC News is on at 16.45 everywhere except Scotland when it’s on at 17.50, and how they do that – do they do a special bulletin exclusively for Scotland, or simply show the first one on a delay and hope nothing happens in the hour between them? We really would like to know, actually.
23.00 Black Sunday
Robert ‘electric toothbrushes’ Shaw stars in this tale of an Israeli agent setting out to prevent a dastardly terrorist plot to drop a bomb from an airship onto the Superbowl thereby preventing the only action which could have stopped it being the most terminally dull sporting event on the planet – and that includes the bowling from Monklands Civic Centre.
BBC2
17.15 Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em
Unless the golf overruns, which we say only so we can moan about just checking our tape of tonight’s episode of The Simpsons on BBC2 and finding it includes 20 minutes of The Weakest Link, three minutes of golf and the first thirty seconds of The Simpsons. That’s completely irrelevant, but it’s pissed us off a bit.
21.00 Great Britons – The Top 100
Were this Channel Four, this’d be fronted by Graham Norton and backed with the same bit from a Daft Punk track over and over again. But this is the BBC, and so this rather ill-conceived attempt to judge who was the most incredible person who ever lived in the UK will be craply fronted by Anne Robinson. Some interesting figures on the list, though – Eric Morecambe, Bobby Moore, all the Beatles except Ringo, Cliff, John Peel and, er, Enoch Powell.
ITV
15.45 Dumbo
The best scene in this none-too-likeable Pinocchio retread proves once again that, when allowed to, the Old Men at Disney could do ‘scary’ like no-one else. Imagine if ‘Uncle’ Walt hadn’t had the storywriters jammed on ‘morbid sentimentality’ for the length of his reign, what bizarreness they could have gotten away with. Still, roll on the much-needed aesthetic shake-up of Bambi. And, er, Victory Through Air Power. Oh, and Creamguide’s got the start of the screening of this on Granada on Good Friday 1990 on tape, because at the beginning some vision mixer accidentally patches through a shot of the empty chair in the continuity suite, which then moves around the screen for five minutes. Which at the time we thought was shit-scary, to be honest.
CHANNEL 4
06.05 The Magic Roundabout
Nigel Planer gets a credit in the RT for the first time we can remember, which does at least confirm that these haven’t been Eric Thompson episodes we’ve been casually dismissing for the last two and a half years.
CHANNEL 5
20.00 The Hit Factory: The Pete Waterman Story
Again? We’re sure this was last on just a few months ago. It’s a Mark Goodier production, of course (“I was drinking a Budweiser, which is a sort of anagram of Wise Buddah”), and apparently it’s not that bad. But how much of C5’s audience increase is down to their arts programming, and how much is down to programmes like the one that follows this, the fantastically-titled, er, Bi-Curious Girls. It’s a serious documentary, honest!
Monday 21st October
BBC1
14.35 Murder She Wrote
Every day this week again. We wouldn’t mind having Bread back here, y’know.
17.00 Blue Peter
Interesting to note that Wednesday’s edition starred only Matt on location, and hence the title sequence was re-edited so only he appeared on it. Not very fair on Liz, mind, who did the opening narration, for some reason. Matt’s doing the main report today as well, and that’s all to the good.
22.35 One On One
Best bit on last week’s Roy Hudd edition was the beginning of an episode of Seaside Special from 1975 when all the acts (including Keith Harris) unconvincingly danced about while they were introduced by Tony Blackburn – back in the day when those sorts of programmes were ‘introduced’ by one person but ‘hosted’ by someone else, something will always thought was reckless overmanning. This has been a fine series overall, and the final show concentrates on David Frost – although given his autobiography’s about a thousand pages long, God alone knows how they’ll fit his whole career into forty minutes.
BBC2
12.00 Taxi
Used to be the only highlight of half-term telly-wise was the chance to see schools programmes that were never intended for your year; all the excitement of learning something you weren’t supposed to be taught for ages. Ahem. Anyway, now there’s five hours of CBBC, which is no fun, then this every day at this time.
13.30 The League of Gentlemen
Honestly, you wait weeks for one good film to come on telly and then…Jack Hawkins leads the gents out on to the parade ground of crime whose number include Nigel Patrick, Roger ‘Blimp’ Livesey, Terence ‘Charlie’ Alexander, Richard Attenborough, David ‘career?’ Lodge and Bryan Forbes. We’re afraid you don’t have any choice but to watch this.
21.00 Never Mind The Buzzcocks
Much as we still enjoy this show, we have problems with recommending tonight’s episode as the atrocious Mark Steel guests, and once more he’ll try to shoehorn in crap bits of his crap standup routine in regardless of whether they’re relevant or not. Billy Bragg, whose performance of his anti-Jubilee song on Top of the Pops was quite the most ludicrous thing seen on telly this year, and Ian McLagan from The Small Faces try to fill the comedic void.
23.20 I’m Alan Partridge
Alan’s Wreakin’ Havoc.
ITV
14.05 Never Had It So Good
Well, at least Des O’Connor doesn’t have to say ‘Coming next, The Psychic Show’ anymore, for which we are eternally grateful, but this Matthew Kelly-fronted nostalgia quiz, shown every day at this time, isn’t much cop, to be honest. Yeah, Fred Dinenage is a captain, but so is Rowland Rivron and he appears not to have seen any television is his life. Melvyn Hayes and Maggie Philbin guest on Wednesday, mind, which may be worth a look.
CHANNEL 4
06.00 The Magic Roundabout
22.35 That Peter Kay Thing
“I won a CB radio with muscular distrophy!” Hooray, it’s Leonard di Tompkinson, the oldest paper boy in Britain, which is basically an excuse for Pete to wander around Bolton doing his ‘things your grandparents say’ routine, and is absolutely fantastic. “You – in a butty!”
CHANNEL 5
11.00 Magnum PI
Seriously, how many episodes of this are there? Every day at this time.
15.40 Disaster on the Coastliner
Is there a chance the track could bend? Stereotypical browned-off ex-employee Paul L ‘you know, Bluto off of Robert Altman’s rubbish Popeye film’ Smith, sets a DLR-style computerised train to ‘crash’, with Lloyd ‘Airplane’ Bridges, Raymond ‘Airplane II’ Burr and William ‘er, Airplane II’ Shatner on board, in this several-holds-barred TV movie disaster.
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Wall of Fact
There’ll be no loose chat – it’s Wall of Fact. And we’re back with a special one-off edition dedicated to bringing you the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth – except for a bit of fun of course! – about the week’s telly. We hope you like our new look!
Who said “My parents lived near Ferndown and my sister had a baby on Leap Year Day, so I called up the editor and asked him if he was interested in the story”? We’ll reveal all at the end of today’s edition*.
So let’s have a quick look around the new Wall of Fact. As you can see, we’ve made a few changes. Towering above is our new gantry of experts, a vast army of television enthusiasts and also, simply large men. And you can join them! We’ll tell you how in a bit. Anyway, their job is to keep us factually on the ball… and we’ll be hearing more from them later on, I bet!
Over here you’ll see this character. Who is he? Looks a bit like a vampire, or is he a scientist? Well, actually it’s Count Factula, and he’s going to be providing us with statistical based facts as we go along. Apparently we can *count* on him to keep us numerically up to speed! Of course dwarfing even the men in the gantry we’ve got the all-new Stack-tistic! Who’s going to be clambering up that, I wonder?
But now, if I can just go around here a bit… here’s our special fact dioramas. Throughout the day we’ve been putting together a special scene which we’re going to act out to you to bring to life one of this week’s facts a bit later on. The team are ready and we think it’s going to be quite a lot of fun. Now let’s move back to the fact desk, where I’m going to read the first of this week’s facts. So no heckling from the gantry!
FACT! Well we’re looking at KRULL which is a film on Channel 5 this week on Saturday at 20.15. And did you know that Francesca Annis who played “The Widow of the Web” jeopardised the application of complicated prosthetics to her face by insisting she ate a bacon and egg sandwich every hour? How about that! I wonder if any of our gantry crew want to pop out for a bacon and egg sandwich. Gantry crew?
Anyway, now we’re going to come around here again and have a look at our diorama. What have we got here? Well, that’s a bearded man in a colourful stripey sweater who looks like he’s filling up custard pies for another man dressed in a chef’s outfit! I wonder what this could represent? Hold on, now I’ve got it! Matthew Kelly’s first job was filling custard pies for Mr Pastry (Richard Hearne)! That’s our fact! And Matthew Kelly can be seen in CITY HOSPITAL, weekdays on BBC1 at 10.00. Hah!
That was great. So, to Count Factula, and we haven’t heard from you so far.
“The BBC’s BREAKFAST studio measures more than 60 feet by 40 feet and sports 20 foot-high double doors.”
And of course you can get your serving of Breakfast every weekday on BBC1 from 06.00. I wonder if anyone from the gantry could beat that numerical fact. No? Well if *you* would like to join our gantry of experts – if indeed we do make another Wall of Fact – then send in a fact to the usual address, and mark your mail “Gantry”. We’ll see you there!
Right now it’s time to face up to… THE STACK-TISTIC! And which loud mouth is going to come down from the gantry to tackle the stack? Look at this! We’ve stacked giant personalities’ faces on top of each other to make a stack of fact. Because behind each face there is a fact. But how high can our volunteer climb? Well let’s see who we’ve got. Ah, and it looks like one of the Creamguide subs is being pushed to the front. Oh yes, we all recognise the former RT Review sub, don’t we? Well, get climbing!
And there he goes, Anneka Rice and Simon Gipps-Kent aren’t proving much of an obstacle. Watch him scramble over Mr T! Will Cheggers prove to be – quite literally – a stumbling block? No! He’s over Cheggers, making mincemeat of Claire Usher from “Claire and Friends” and, oh no! It looks like the stack is collapsing! He’s reached Christopher Timothy’s face and the stack has caved in on him! Where is he? Is he OK? Oh no! Let me just tell you that he’s revealed the fact that when he took on the role of James Herriott in All Creatures Great and Small, Christopher Timothy was actually the last person to be cast on the programme – just weeks before they began filming. Oh, and Christopher Timothy can be seen in DOCTORS on BBC1, weekdays at 14.05. Is that his hand? I can see his hand. There, under Chris Serle!
Well, while we sort out this mess, let me say goodbye from all of us here at Wall of Fact. That’s our gantry of TV freaks, the Wall of Fact players and of course – who could forget him? – Count Factula. And it’s goodbye from me too, Paul McDowell. Goodbye!
*Our quote was from Anne Diamond, who can be seen in FAME, SET AND MATCH on BBC2 at 21.05 on BBC2.
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Tuesday 22nd October
BBC1
23.05 Smokey and the Bandit III
Time once again to imagine how much better the original version of this film, Smokey is the Bandit, with Gleason in a ludicrous dual role, must have been than this re-shot mess with erstwhile Bandit chum Jerry ‘Bat*21’ Reed filling in for Reynolds. Not much, remains our estimate.
BBC2
13.10 The Siege of Sidney Street
Interesting Edwardian historical melodrama in which police inspector Donald ‘mmmwwaaargh, Smallbridge’ Sinden confronts a gang of desperate anarchist Latvian immigrants, among them Leonard ‘a repository of rambunctious rhetoric’ Sachs and Peter ‘you’re pretty way out yourself’ Wyngarde as ‘Peter the painter’, at their East End headquarters. With veteran Hammer scriptwriter Jimmy ‘Dracula’ Sangster as hands-on Home Sec Winston ‘you’ll have to speak up, I’m wearing a towel’ Churchill.
18.20 TOTP2
Well, it’s another of those weeks when we don’t have a clue what’s going to be on this programme, so we’ll take this opportunity to mention the best bit on last week’s episodes, which was of course Legs and Co dancing to Jaws. According to Jeff Simpson’s new Pops book, which we like but also hate because we always wanted to write it, that was their first ever appearance. And if they could dance to that, they could dance to anything, really.
22.00 The Booker Prize 2002
“I’m sorry, what’s your name, please?”
ITV
21.50 The Frank Skinner Show
Charles Kennedy’s appearance last week means that Frank’s interviewed two of the three main party leaders, which is two more than some “journalist” or other has managed. Just a shame this programme isn’t very funny anymore, alas.
CHANNEL 5
22.00 Full Metal Jacket
Channel Five give the great first half/so-so second half Marine Corps training saga yet another reacharound. Point of soundtrack order – we all know that “Abigail Mead” was really Kubick’s daughter Vivian, but whither the mysterious Nigel Goulding these days?
Wednesday 23rd October
BBC1
17.00 Blue Peter
Unfortunately the half-term holidays have seen the repeat the following morning shunted forwards to ten past seven, the gits. Even the repeat of Woody Woodpecker gets a better slot. But if this is what we need to put up with to get it back thrice-weekly again, that’s a price we’re willing to pay, almost.
19.35 Bloomers’ Best Bits
This schedule’s a mess, Lorraine, sort it out! Followed by the lottery, which last night had the results announced at half-time in the football by Deadly, followed by a recording of the draw after the news with “recorded earlier” in the corner of the screen, just to prove they weren’t lying. Why they couldn’t do the whole thing live after the news is presumably down to some baffling clause in Camelot’s contract. It was certainly a hassle for Deadly, anyway, bearing in mind half his commentary normally consists of just telling us the time – “just before eight o’clock this Wednesday evening!”.
20.30 Fawlty Towers
Frantic and overstreched silly-walk comedy from ex-Python.
BBC2
13.15 What a Carve Up!
Are we back on track for Alf’s Button Afloat, then? Hopefully the appearance of this Sidney ‘Citizen’ James and Kenneth ‘Ooooh Nora!’ Connor vehicle heralds a return to senses by film wallahs after a few weeks of terminal awfulness in the schedules. The appearance of Dennis Price, at the outset of his Brown Ale Years, makes this a must-see. Can we have ‘I’ve Gotta Horse’ now, please?
18.20 TOTP2
Dunno what’s on here, either, so instead we’ll mention the tape we acquired from Creamguide’s dad’s work colleague this week which contained a snippet of the 1984 Christmas edition, something we’ve been eager to see because that was the year when the acts themselves introduced the programme. What this meant was, after performing The Reflex, Simon Le Bon went to the mike and shouted ‘Now you’re gonna see Nik Kershaw’ while gasping for breath. Even Andy Peebles would’ve made a better job of it, to be honest.
ITV
00.00 Throw Momma from the Train
Danny DeVito’s directorial debut is not bad at all in this tale of his persuasion of Billy Crystal to off his demonic mother, Anne ‘Hit puree!’ Ramsay. Ramsay is the star – obviously – if only because her character drinks Pepsi from a china cup and saucer, like all elderly women should.
CHANNEL 4
06.00 The Magic Roundabout
13.30 A Challenge for Robin Hood
Barry ‘Alydon’ Ingham plays the green-clad one in this adaptation from post-glory years Hammer, but naturally we’re more interested in James ‘Mr Tebbs, you know, the short-lived, toupeed Mr Grainger replacement off of Are You Being Served?’ Hayter as Friar Tuck.
Thursday 24th October
BBC1
23.45 A Cry in the Dark
It’s laughs galore in this true tale of Lindy Chamberlain whose baby was taken during the night by wild dingo’s in the Australian outback and the ensuing accusations against her. Distinguished for Streep’s powerhouse performnace and for being the only Australian film ever not to feature Bill Hunter. Also starring Bud Tingwell, natch.
BBC2
13.10 One Good Turn
“Pitkiiin!” Although Mr Grimsdale isn’t in this one, but Thora Hird, Arthur Mullard and Shirley ‘zither’ Abicair are. Still, this should mark an end to these films appearing on BBC2 for a while, which can only be a good thing.
19.30 The Good Life
What annoyed us what that we already had the previous two episodes of The Simpsons on tape, but not this one. And if nothing else, it makes our tapes look all messy.
21.50 Look Around You
“Millsy remains at a constant height throughout.” Hooray! The first episode of this was everything we’d hoped for and more – it looked fabulous, and it was also jam-packed full of cracking jokes. And at only ten minutes long it doesn’t have time to overstay it’s welcome. This is not just lazy “Remember Bagpuss” stuff, it’s great comedy in any case. Best thing on telly at the moment, we’re saying.
CHANNEL 4
21.00 The Real Tony Blackburn
“On that day I was determind to be brighter and breezier than a thousand redcoats.” LAY has some competition tonight, though, from this excellent-sounding documentary which examines the career of the self-styled ‘living legend’ and ropes in people like John Peel to comment.
22.35 Status Quo: Rock On and On
Meanwhile this show goes behind the scenes with the Stattus Quo on their tour last year, and we are, of course, hoping for Daniels-style ‘counterweighted door’ hilarity to come out of it. Fortunately, TV Go Home appears to have finished.
Friday 25th October
BBC1
17.00 Blue Peter
Yes! BP goes back three nights a week, as it should be, which is fantastic news for two reasons; a) Friday’s the day we’re allowed to leave TVC Towers earlier than usual so we get to see it, and b) tonight’s show sees the start of The Quest II! The first was the best, and most demented, thing this programme has ever done, and we’re sure this new run will live up to it, even if Liz doesn’t dress up as a serving wench again. Sorry, we really must stop doing this, mustn’t we?
00.50 The Sorcerers
Ageing hypnotist Boris ‘Bikini Beach’ Karloff is pressured by nasty wife Catherine ‘Whisky Galore!’ Lacey into controlling the mind of young turk Ian ‘Return of’ Ogilvy for a spot of vicarious rejuvenation. Neat little no-budget mod-horror from Tigon, auteured by doomed maverick Michael ‘Witchfinder’ Reeves. With Susan ‘Kitty’ George, Dani ‘daughter of Dinah’ Sheridan, Gerald ‘Bunter’ Campion and the regulation lashings of antiquated ‘laboratory equipment’.
BBC2
13.15 The Phil Silvers Show
Long gone are the days when the only concession to half term was Daytime UK getting some kids in to review videos…
22.00 Porridge
… or This Morning showing a Disney cartoon.
CHANNEL 4
06.00 The Magic Roundabout
12.50 The Enemy Below
Well, if we’ve got to have a war film, it might as well be a good ‘un. Robert Mitchum is the American goodie – all starch and khaki – while Curt ‘Stromberg’ Jurgens is the naughty Nazi baddie – mostly off-white woolly polo necks and brandy – in this tale of WWII daring on the high seas. Also starring Doug ‘Troy’ McClure.
CHANNEL 5
02.50 Miracles
Dire screwball comedy with divorcees Tom ‘Norman Conquests’ Conti and Terri ‘Quick, suck it’ Garr thrown together for a ker-azy big budget multi-location rollercoaster ride of unoriginal set-pieces, lousy ‘waspish’ cross-talk and Christopher Lloyd in sleepwalking ‘demented’ mode.
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DIGI-CREAMGUIDE
* Seemingly Jim Bowen’s sacking from Radio Lancashire, which is at least good news for the people responsible for supplying swivel chairs for the studios, has scared Granada Plus off him too, as Bullseye’s disappeared from the schedules. This means that the only thing worth watching on that channel (Peak Practice five nights a week?!) is The Kenny Everett Video Show on Saturday at 22.30 and 04.30. Incdientally, Jim’s replacement on the airwaves of Blackburn seems to be Ted ‘Banana Grove’ Robbins, so they’d better dig out that copy of More Than In Love from the record library.
* Paramount are still showing something called Anyone For Pennis? at 22.05 on Sunday, and we insist that he only did four programmes, one of which was a compilation of the first three. Thursday’s Comedy Store, meanwhile, at 23.05, features Peter Kay, or as the Radio Times puts it, “the hilarious Peter Kay”. Dunno what routine he does on it, though. Have they shown the episode with John Gordillo on it yet?
* Dunno where Sky are going to get the footage for Football Years from (Wednesday, 22.00, Sky One), as it’s 1988/89. BSB had the rights to the FA Cup at that point, but they didn’t begin transmitting until at least the end of the season, and Sky had bugger all, so it may be Brian Moore, Martin Tyler, Alan Parry and David “Poetic justice” Pleat all the way. More football on Saturday as BBC4 repeat The Game Of Their Lives (23.00), the documentary about North Korea’s World Cup exploits in 1966, which were commentated on by Frank Bough, in a neat bit of symmetry. As he explains in his other book, Cue Frank!, when they beat Italy, he said “What’s going on here?”, which everyone thought was a great line, much to the chagrin of Barry Davies who was commentating on it for ITV and had seen Frank rehearse it for the previous hour. Or as Frank puts it, “1966. World Cup. Middlesbrough. North Korea! Italy! Amazing! 1-0!”, etc.
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IT’S THE NEW SEASON ON TVC
“I think there will be less loose chat in the future. Everybody will be there for a specific purpose. It will have a strong political thread but it won’t all be head-bangingly serious, it will be a good popular mix. It is a tall order, but I don’t think it is impossible.” So said Dave Stanford relaunching Breakfast Time in 1986, as did the residents of TVC Towers when relaunching Ask The Family this week. It’s a new look for the familiar forums, which intends to answer your retro-telly questions faster and in a less short-tempered fashion than ever before. It also has a new Creamguide mailbox, ready for your comments, which is good because the last one was looking embarrassingly empty. It’s all to be found at http://tv.cream.org, which has also had an overhaul and includes a huge swathe of fantastic new features. And it still costs absolutely no pence whatsoever on your part!
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TV Creamy – Chris Hughes, Ian Jones, Simon Tyers, Bar Six, Fulica Atra, Uncle Feedle, Les, Feedback Report, Clive
