How We Used To List: 7th-13th SEPTEMBER 2002

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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
7th – 13th September 2002
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Dished! – Phil Norman, Chris Diamond
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Saturday 7th September

BBC1

17.35 Only Fools and Horses
It’s the 21st anniversary of Only Fools and Horses this week, which would have been the ideal opportunity to show one of the new episodes, only they haven’t got around to making them yet, and besides, it’s supposed to be a celebration, not a wake. Instead – some old repeats. With Christmas 1992, you may wonder how this differs from any other week, but tomorrow there is a fairly welcome surprise.

00.05 100 Rifles
Burt Reynolds robs a bank to buy guns to help his people in Mexico, first chased then helped by Jim ‘I haven’t killed anybody for a loooong time’ Brown. Most notable for the scene in which Raquel Welch strips off for a shower. Dead artistic it is and central to the plot of course.

BBC2

13.10 Columbo
14.45 Quincy
15.30 Perry Mason
Unsurprising to read clueless newspaper hacks going on about last Saturday’s Grandstand getting no viewers and being beaten by this old rubbish, while nobody picked up on the fact that Grandstand still managed to beat The Goal Rush and the C&G Trophy cricket on C4 – “cricket’s equivalent of the FA Cup”! Beaten by mountain biking!

17.00 Hi-De-Hi!
Hope this didn’t beat Grandstand.

18.50 Steptoe and Son
BBC2, so it must be black and white.

ITV

15.10 Carry On Laughing
Apparently on On The Ball last week Gabby Logan said “If you want to see mountain biking and skateboarding, you’ll have to go elsewhere”. Wonder if she’ll say that this week given the show’s followed by this and a crap one-star fantasy film with Dan Ackroyd.

18.00 Bruce Forsyth’s Play Your Cards Right
Yaaaaaayyy! Brucie and David Liddiment have settled their differences – over a drink in the bar after the show – and the result is that he’s back where he belongs on the best thing he ever did for ITV (apart from Sammy and Bruce). We read reports that they were going to rename this series Card Sharks, as in the American original, to emphasise that this new series has got really huge prizes, though thankfully the sense of history prevailed. Mind you, it’s only 25 minutes long, and we don’t want one second of priceless Brucie banter cut out. “Ron Keith? Not Keith Ron?”

01.10 Forever
A new series! And having run out of years, they’ve moved on to genres, so from being a pale imitation of I Love it’s now a pale imitation of Top Ten. And the first theme is Girl Power, so you can guess the line-up.

04.30 Get Stuffed
Well, The Big Match Replayed seems to have finally ended, but ITV Night Time don’t let us down with this, the return of the legendary 4am classic, showing four nights this week (also Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday at equally coveted timeslots). It may be a new series, it may be repeats, but it certainly won’t be worth watching unless you’re unable to get up from in front of the telly. And if ITV are trying to return to the days when they ruled the overnight schedules, we want Gaz Top Non Stop back next.

CHANNEL 4

02.30 Scrubbers
Another outing for this ill-advised all-female version of Scum, directed by Mai Zetterling, no less. Kathy Burke, Imogen ‘Bugs’ Bain, Debby ‘Carrott’s Lib’ Bishop and, er, Chrissie ‘Unnovations’ Cotterill are among the inmates, and Pam St. Clement, Miriam Margolyes and Robbie Coltrane add to the forced grimness and screaming.

CHANNEL 5

08.00 James The Cat
We hear that the Grampian name may be spared after SMG recently threatened to drop it. But in any case, this show keeps the memory alive.

01.20 Purple Hearts
Another film solely devised to allow Lee Ermey to shout at people in a threatening but wrly amusing fashion. And so to the plot; a navy surgeon falls in love and volunteers for a dangerous mission to get a bit of time off to spend with his new bird. You wonder how a man who failed to see the hole in that plan ever managed to qualify as a surgeon. Honestly, our lives in their hands.

03.10 The Punch and Judy Man
Hancock’s first film is a bit dark and not as much fun as The Rebel, we’re saying. As a seaside Punch and Judy man the lad ‘imself gets driven to distraction by the council and the holidaymakers and ends up at the Lord Mayor’s ball but things go wrong for him, natch. It was a complete disaster when it came out in the pictures – no doubt people wanted to see Cheam shenanigans – but far better thought of now. In fact, we’ve always contended that the scene in the ice cream parlour when everything he does is copied by the little boy was used by Spielberg in Jaws when Roy Scheider’s son does the same at the dinner table. In any case it keeps the Cream quotient well up with Sylvia ‘Ice Cold’ Sims, Ronald ‘Wrath’ Fraser, John Le Mesurier, Hugh ‘black ones’ Lloyd, Mario ’10-4′ Fabrizi, and Hattie ‘Welcoming Land’ Jacques all featuring, among others.

05.35 Sons and Daughters
Seemingly worried by the renewed ITV competition, just the one episode tonight. But still two on Friday, at 05.10.

Sunday 8th September

BBC1

13.00 Flight of the Navigator
Compliance! As nippers, we were always amazed by how the big, silver, nut-shaped ship managed to look like it was floating so well… until we watched it again and noticed in a scene where it’s sitting on top of a hill that you can see the shadow of the scaffolding it’s sitting on. Anyway, you know the story – surely? – which features Paul ‘Pee Wee Herman’ Ruebens as the voice of the spaceship… and no one else really and to be perfectly honest, if ever there was a film that *should* have featured Dabney Coleman, it was this one.

18.05 Only Fools and Horses
Here’s the special birthday treat, then – episode one, which is not that special in itself as they wheel it out on a seemingly annual basis, but for the first time in many years, with the original Ronnie Hazelhurst-penned theme intact! Of course, it’s now overdubbed by the current theme for repeats, but we recall they showed the 1981 Christmas show in 1999 with it on, perhaps by accident. Well, we were excited.

BBC2

17.15 Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em
This is the new Good Life, isn’t it?

ITV

18.30 Game Show Losers
Not entirely sure what we’re going to get in this documentary, apart from the woman who walked into a door before appearing on Mastermind, as seen on hundreds of other shows and all with Magnus boringly telling the anecdote and sucking all humour out of it with his dreary delivery, again and again. Still, Richard Whiteley’s interviewed, so that’s one reason for tuning into what actually looks like It Shouldn’t Happen To A Game Show Contestant.

CHANNEL 5

21.00 The Lost Boys
We bet you thought this was brilliant when it was first out. It hasn’t really worn that well, though, as we discovered when we found it on video a while ago. Frankly, there is nothing even vaguely threatening about Kiefer Sutherland even with comedy teeth and it’s difficult to maintain a mood of terror and fear with constant shouts of ‘That’s him from Bill and Ted’ and ‘Is Corey Feldman actually related to Marty Feldman, then?’ Also the female interest is called Star, for heaven’s sake, and her little vampire brother really should have been topped early on, if only for wearing a Sergeant Pepper jacket. Still, Edward ‘Overboard’ Hermann is quite scary at the end and Barnard ‘Tron’ Hughes is the scariest, and he’s not even a vampire. It’s sad to say, however, that even taking all that into consideration, we’ll still be watching it.

Monday 9th September

BBC1

14.35 Murder She Wrote
Come on, BBC, the kids are back in school now, stick on some interesting stuff. Every day at this time, except Wednesday.

17.00 Blue Peter
They’re back live in the studio after their piddly summer break, and thus today’s show obviously includes their first report from the expedition to Mozambique. And news on whether the pets are all still alive.

22.35 One On One
Not a clue what’s going on here, a new series of “showbiz self-portraits”. It basically seems to be someone famous just blathering on about themselves, a format which could make for incredibly tedious viewing; but not tonight cos it’s Terry Wogan and they’ll show loads of clips! “No David, they’re not laughing *with* you…”

00.15 Puppet on a Chain
Amsterdam-set drug caper with Patrick ‘Natwest, Barclays, Midland, Lloyd’s. Use a bank? I’d rather die!’ Allen.

BBC2

10.00 Tweenies
Yeah, a lazy student reference, maybe, but this is the episode where they mount their own episode of Top of the Pops, surely the only pre-school programme to refer to The Clash. Honestly, it’s truly brilliant.

23.20 I’m Alan Partridge
Funny how the most acclaimed and popular of all the Partridge vehicles (and that’s obviously the case here, as almost everyone can recite huge chunks of the script, even our parents) gets flung out in a much later slot than all the others in this season. Mind you, it has been on rather a lot recently.

ITV

02.40 The Entertainers
We’re not billing The New Addams Family, and this is just clinging on by the skin of its teeth, especially when boring old Susannah York’s the subject. However it does mean that two channels are showing programmes with signing at the same time, which must be a first.

CHANNEL 4

06.00 The Magic Roundabout

09.00 Little House On The Prairie
Presumably the schools programmes are back next week, so this week is your last helping of daily episodes. And if the cricket’s already finished, it’s on again today at 10.40!

10.00 Happy Days
This’ll be on regardless…

10.30 Film Fever
…but this won’t, on;y appearing if it’s all over at The Oval. It’s a look at how young fans are getting into Carry On films, but they’ve unfortunately neglected to screen Carry On Cabby to convert even more people.

13.45 Mr Hobbs Takes a Vacation
Not if the cricket hasn’t finished, he doesn’t. Jimmy Stewart and Maureen ‘McClintock!’ O’Hara head for the seaside in this lightweight family drama. Herb ‘Keep Your Eye on Me’ Alpert and pompadoured goon Fabian feature.

CHANNEL 5

06.30 Dappledown Farm
Now Jazza Bowen’s left Breakfast there’s no excuse. Every day at this time.

11.00 Magnum PI
Meanwhile Words and Pictures is back, so don’t bother with this, also every day at this time.

15.40 Simon
Madeleine ‘let’s face it, I’m bushed’ Kahn brainwashes Alan Arkin into thinking he’s an alien in this sub-Sleeper sci-fi comedy, leading to various attempts at heavy-handed cultural satire. Fred Gwynne, Dick Cavett and David ‘Norman Conquests’ Susskind cameo.

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Gallingly, RT REVIEW is unable to be with us this week. While searching for a replacement, we noticed a number of letters of complaint about Creamguide’s Films output. Not only was the Hands of the Ripper billing all wrong, but it was reprimanded for the general tone of the film section. “Moaning about westerns simply isn’t what people want during their Friday mid-morning skive,” thundered the Editor. “Why can’t you be more proactive, do some extra-curricular bit of business or something, like that nice Radio Creamguide editor?” And so, we present…

THE CREAMGUIDE (FILMS) EXTRA-CURRICULAR BIT OF BUSINESS
This week – Digi-Cine-Creamguide

Well, you can imagine the expressions on our change-fearing faces when we opened up this week’s RT to see – horror of horrors! – they’ve merged the terrestrial films in with something they’re calling ‘best of digital’! Now, we’re guessing this unnecessary shakeup is a page-saving managerial decision, and doesn’t reflect on AC’s editorship (which now sees him presiding over the films pages from an executive comfy chair, we note), but still – grrrr. Nevertheless, we’re nothing if not game, so this seems the ideal cue for us to present our own ‘best of’ the week’s digital offerings. After all, where else can you see Coyote Ugly on the hour, every hour?

FILMFOUR
Wednesday, 01.15
Nuts In May – Leigh’s magisterial Sloman-Steadman Play for Today is the only reason we can see this week for subscribing to “The Ailing FilmFour” (TM), although you can save even more money by buying the budget-priced video of it from HMV instead.

FILMFOUR WORLD
Sunday, 16.00
Fantastic Planet – We don’t have this channel, and nor do you. It’ll probably be axed in a few months. But today it’s showing this unnerving ’70s French animation, overdubbed by Barry ‘Scruples’ Bostwick and Marvin ‘voice of The Commissioner off the Pink Panther cartoons’ Miller, to no-one, which is nice.

SCI-FI
Saturday, 17.00
Futureworld – Tarnished sequel to the overpraised Westworld, with Peter Fonda and Blythe Danner (as ‘Socks’, no less) investigating a cloning conspiracy at the futuristic equivalent of the western theme park. The obligatory huge computers, shoestring representations of Usbourne Book of the Future-style pastimes (the ‘holographic’ chess is a winner) and an all-dancing dream sequence with Yul Brynner which shamelessly pisses on the memory of the original all add to the fun. Now, if they can get clearance for Beyond Westworld we’d be sorted.

Monday, 02.05
The Pit and the Pendulum – Vincent Price stars in Corman’s mish-mash of Poe tales, with the best bit easily being the final, titular, segment. Formerly regulars on most ITV regions at this hour, but nowadays you have to fork out, it seems.

SKY MOVIES CINEMA (just love those tautologous channel titles!)
Saturday, 06.00, 13.00
Doc Savage: the Man of Bronze – Ron ‘Tarzan’ Ely stars in this enjoyably tawdry pulp adaptation with the rollicking theme tune, hated by Savage purists apparently, which is all the better.

Saturday, 00.05
Dracula Has Risen from the Grave – Christopher Lee returns for this oddly subdued bridge between the acknowledged ’50s Hammer classics and the derided ’50s likes of Dracula AD1972. Barbara ‘Comrade Dad’ Ewing, Michael Ripper and George A. ‘Donkey?’ Cooper wonder what goin’ on up at the ol’ caaarsul.

Sunday, 22.00, 03.25
The Keep – Quick! Remember back in 1998 when you taped Castle Keep off Channel Five, and stored the tape safely away vowing “one day, I shall complete my collection of ponderously-paced psychological horror films with pretentions way above their station, about a bunch of Nazis guarding a remote Eastern European fort and one by one succumbing to supernatural happenings”? Well, now’s the time to act! This is, amusingly, based on an entirely different novel with the same plot, albeit a more sci-fi, less literary one. But that doesn’t stop Michael Mann wheeling out the latex bogeymen with all the pomp and bluster he can muster, plus everyone’s least favourite soundtrack composers, Tangerine Dream.

Wednesday, 09.30, 04.10
Head – The career-sabotaging Monkees classic is of course tailor made for on-stop digital syndication, though we’re not too sure about that half-nine slot, to be frank. Basically a feature-length episode of the series, as if rewritten by some semi-politically aware UCLA critcal theory students, and with all the jokes taken out and put back in the wrong places, but with a much better soundtrack, pick of the crop being Carole King’s exquisite Porpoise Song and a live Circle Sky. We’ve always had a soft spot for Daddy’s Song, too. And the same thing goes for Christmas.

SKY MOVIES MAX 4
Tuesday, 07.10, 15.00
Bionic Showdown: the Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman – Mindstretchingly ill-advised reunion of Wagner and Majors, now both well into middle age but called upon once more to don the slow motion tracksuits of legend. Again. This time with Sandra ‘career still missing’ Bullock as a junior bionic compadre.

SKY MOVIES MAX 5 (do they really need *that* many of them?)
Saturday, 16.30
Bionic Ever After? – More bionic reunion flammery. Oh, and they’re getting married in this one, is the plot. Also on Wed at 08.30 and 14.00 on Sky Movies Max 2, confusingly enough.

THE STUDIO
Sunday, 14.00
Condorman – Probably our favourite of all the movie channels, The Studio. The Granada Plus of filmdom, if you will. We watched The Stunt Man on there a couple of weeks back, something we haven’t seen on terrestrial in nearly ten years. Here’s another one that used to be all over the schedules, to say nothing of Screen Test, but now seems to have buggered off forever. So cheer once more for Michael Crawford as he hang-glides into battle with a Russian Oliver Reed.

Wednesday, 11.45
Mutiny on the Buses – Funny old Hammer, eh? At the same time as the aforementioned Dracula AD1972 was being shrugged off the production line, they were also making the rather great Vampire Circus, the films of That’s Your Funeral and Nearest and Dearest, and this, the Windsor Safari Park-plugging central pillar of the ‘Buses trilogy – and, if we’re honest, of all our lives. The darts match alone is worth the price of admission here.

Wednesday, 22.30
Yellowbeard – Graham Chapman and Peter Cook’s ill-starred pirate comedy is worth the once-through for curiosity’s sake, if only to see how many formerly great partnerships are run to ground – Chapman, Eric Idle and John Cleese off You Know What, Peter Boyle, Marty Feldman, Madeline Kahn and Kenneth Mars off Young Frankenstein, er, Cheech and Chong, plus Michael Hordern, James Mason, Spike Milligan, Nigel Planer, Susannah York, Beryl Reid, Peter Bull, Bernard Fox, Ronald Lacey, Bernard McKenna and, of course, David Bowie as a shark.

Friday, 13.30
Xanadu – Revivalist musicals, eh? From New York, New York through to Absolute Beginners, there was always someone trying to ‘recapture the magic’ of the MGM days back then. We blame Bob Fosse for making it look easy. But this leg-warmered slice of Pacific disco glamp (It’s glam! It’s camp!) is probably the “warning from history” plum of them all. Daughter of Zeus (aka Wilfrid ‘daffodill’ Hyde-White) Olivia Newton-John comes to Earth to help Michael ‘Warriors’ Beck build a roller disco while the venerable Gene Kelly dances through as best he can. Even if you, somehow, really, *really* like ELO *and* The Tubes, it’s a long haul.

So, what have we learnt? Well, true to the old ‘satellite TV early adopter’ stereotype, if you’re into sci-fi, horror, fantasy, soft porn and other Simpsons’ Comic Book Guy staples, you’re pretty well-served. If, however, you like the occasional… other sort of thing, it’s probably not that much more rewarding than terrestrial, all told. The actual Sky movie channels are as arbitrary as ITV in choosing what to put out. FilmFour, we have to say, isn’t really worth it, but The Studio is sometimes OK. Oh, and every other week Hallmark seem to show an ancient edition of This Is Your Life with Laurel and Hardy as guests, which is mesmerising for too many reasons to list here. That’s all for this week. Oh, by the way, below these asterisks, it’s terrestrial again. Sorry, we should’ve thought of a less confusing format for this section. Next week, Teach Yourself Marianne Stone.

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Tuesday 10th September

BBC1

00.05 Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex (But Were Afraid to Ask)
Woody knows what it means to work hardon machines in the final and best segment of this all-over-the-place sketch assemblage. Anthony Quayle and Lynn Redgrave feature in the opening medieval sketch, and Gene Wilder fondles his lamb’s wool sweater in another, and the numbers are made up by a dull Fellini spoof and an out-of-place Goodiesesque sketch with John Carradine.

BBC2

16.00 Yes Minister
The first episode again, though seemingly not start of a regular repeat run, rather to fill time after the TUC Conference.

18.20 TOTP2
So that ‘every hundredth show’ idea went up the sawnny, then, and instead we’ve got four very loosely themed compilations, mixing incredibly familiar stuff with the odd rarity – most notably last week’s clip of Cliff singing Good Times Better Times in 1969 in a nippy Italian suit, which we’ve never seen before. Though seemingly with good reason, as the sound quality was truly dreadful, as if we were listening to it on AM radio. Anyway, ‘British bands’ is the “theme” tonight, much like most other episodes have the “theme” of ‘pop records’. Still, Slade, The Move and The Stattus Quo.

22.00 Porridge
Better than most of the Comedy Night output, of course.

ITV

19.30 Star Wars
Undistinguished Battlestar Galactica try-out starring William ‘Porkins’ Hootkins.

21.50 The Frank Skinner Show
Not sure about this curious timeslot even if we get films preceding it every week, because the Champions League is back next week and surely a channel totally committed to football can’t put the highlights on at 11pm, can they? Ahem. In any case, there’s normally, if not a Creamy clip, then a West Bromwich anecdote on this show – like the one about his local paper being called The Smethwick Telephone.

23.30 Spaceballs
“Merchandising! Merchandising!” “We ain’t found shit!” Pizza the Hut, Mr Radar, We Brake for Nobody, Ludicrous Speed… well, that takes care of that.

CHANNEL 4

10.00 Tiara Tahiti!
Ex-army foes James Mason and John Mills battle it out over a hotel deal, with Peter “Telford’s Change” Barkworth and Roy Kinnear. Last seen October ’01.

21.00 Seven Days That Shook The Spice Girls
Oh, come on, you loved them five years ago. This is presumably from the people behind SDTS Man United, but unlike that rotten documentary, they may actually have some footage to illustrate the points. Spiceworld, the nearest thing we got to a CFF film in the 90s, right down to the grainy picture and sound quality, is featured, as is when Geri left, which reminds us of watching that fateful Lottery show where they first appeared as a foursome, and our flatmate saying “They must be going down the dumper if they’re only on the midweek one!” Well, we laughed.

00.05 Top Ten Rap
For some reason it’s Music Night on C4 tonight, as we’ve also got Biggie and Tupac, and another outing for Flava Flav and Mark Lamarr. Not a bad show, this, including a deathly dull interview with De La Soul and MC Hammer at number one.

Wednesday 11th September

BBC1

17.00 Blue Peter
Ludicrous survey in the papers this week which complained about the amount of imports on children’s TV, particularly… Neighbours! Eh? Just to point out, Gentle Ben was still being shown in 1992. And they also moaned about a lack of news, which seems an odd comment because that seems to suggest all kid’s channels should just rip-off Newsround. And there’s enough improving stuff around anyway – look, here’s Simon telling the story of Vivaldi.

19.00 This Is Your Life
Yes, this is what we’ve been waiting for – a repeat of the Fern Britton episode! Gus Honeybun, Fred’s tour of Meridian; it’s all here.

BBC2

12.30 The Phil Silvers Show
Presumably to ensure you don’t drop off during the TUC coverage. Course a decade ago, that was on BBC1 all day. Tell that to Bargain Hunt viewers and they’ll laugh.

18.20 TOTP2
We dunno what this show is about, though as Spandau Ballet and Bryan Adams are featured, we suspect ‘landmarks’, given the Spands were number one on the thousandth show in 1983, performing in front of a message writer saying
H A P P Y 1 0 0 0
F R O M
S P A N D A U B A L L E T
‘ T R U E ‘ ,
and, er, so on. “Happy 1000 from all at Virgin” at one point, too.

ITV

02.50 You Pay Your Money
Also-ran programme filler with Honor Blackman, courtesy the Butcher’s Film Service, natch. Wonder when we’ll get to see Old Mother Riley Catches a Quisling in this slot?

CHANNEL 4

10.00 Doctor at Large
Having graduated as a fully fledged doctor, and entirely cognoscent of what the bleeding time is, Dirk Bogarde launches himself as a rural practitioner with ha-ha-hilarious results in the sequel to Doctor In The House with James ‘see above’ Robertson Justice, Donald ‘Twain’ Sinden, Lionel ‘P.O.S.H.’ Jeffries, Bill ‘Bert’ Fraser, Dandy ‘Moo’ Nichols and Ronnie ‘Cruising’ Stevens. Among others, of course.

Thursday 12th September

BBC2

01.20 What Have The Eighties Ever Done For Us?
A sad day when this makes up a third of the billings.

CHANNEL 4

10.00 Gideon of Scotland Yard
Just an ordinary run of the mill day for Chief Inspector George Gideon – Jack Hawkins, that is – encompassing four murders, two robberies and a suspension. It’s a bind innit? Directed by John Ford, would you believe, and with Miles Malleson, James ‘Mr Tebbs, you know, the short-lived, toupeed Mr Grainger replacement off of Are You Being Served?’ Hayter and Cyril ‘451’ Cusack.

22.00 Peter Kay’s Phoenix Nights
Last in the series which hasn’t been as good as the previous one, we think, but still a cut above every other sitcom at the moment. And it’s been a huge hit, which has meant that C4 are going to repeat the fantastic That Peter Kay Thing, apparently from next week. Which is brilliant news. “If you cut me in half, you’d find Accrington written right through me!”

Friday 13th September

BBC1

19.30 Top of the Pops
So here we are, show 2000 – expect that was weeks ago, we’re sure of it. Anyway, tonight’s the night they’ve chosen to celebrate it, but it’s only half a long and may just be a bog-standard edition; though that’s OK if it means we don’t get anything like the dire Top Of The Pops Goes Large, which was preceded by Chris Cowey going on about how it all was all about the music, only for the music to then take second place behind interviews with some people we don’t know off EastEnders.

00.10 Perfect Friday
Heist caper starring Ursula Andress, Stanley Baker and David ‘Tron as well’ Warner as the collaboraters and directed by Peter Hall as the second entrant in our Great Directors Do Films You Wouldn’t Expect Them To Week.

01.45 Robbery
This Stanley Baker Great Train dramatisation (with the names changed to protect the guilty) has the rare honour of featuring both Van Der Valks – Frank ‘the TV films’ Finlay and Barry ‘the series proper’ Foster – along with Robert ‘Hannay’ Powell, James ‘Kenny Ames, you know, Ally Fraser’s dodgy mate with the yacht in series two of Auf Wiedersehen, Pet’ Booth, Barry ‘Mann’s Best Friends’ Stanton, Julie ‘Pompeii’ Ege, Frank ‘yes, your reverence’ Williams and Minder’s Glynn “Ello, Arfur! V ‘n’ T?” Edwards. Last seen November ’01.

BBC2

13.40 Five Card Stud
After last week it was thought wise to talk up a western for a change, so… Dean Martin and Robert Mitchum star in a tale of a card cheat lynched against Martin’s wishes. The rest of the players in the game get bumped off one by one and Martin tries to figure who’s responsible. It also has a cracking theme by Dino and also features Roddy ‘Ceaser’ McDowell and Yaphet Kotto. So there.

19.30 The Good Life
BBC2, *will* you stop showing this programme!

CHANNEL 4

06.00 The Magic Roundabout

00.10 Peter Kay’s Phoenix Nights
And come on, “I’ll throw in a pig’s dick for the dog!” was the best line in any sitcom ever.

CHANNEL 5

14.30 Open House with Gloria Hunniford
George Fenton is Glo’s guest today. And if he does requests, someone ask for Telly Addicts for us, please.

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PROPER DIGI-CREAMGUIDE

BBC PARLIAMENT
Eh?! A debut appearance in Creamguide for this channel, and *what* a debut! Thing is, Creamguide was flicking around the channel the other day, and noticed Parliament announcing that they’re intending to show, in full – the BBC coverage of the 1979 and 1997 elections! Decision 79 is on Saturday between 09.00 and 00.00, although quite why they’re showing it, God alone knows, as it’s probably their worst ever performance on the night, missing out results and, of course, showing Play School instead of Thatch entering number ten. We cannot confirm that they’re showing Mike Yarwood’s Show We Couldn’t Show, which was screened at 10.10pm on the night, but we may well get Election Question Time (“David Dimbleby is joined by Robin Day, Robert McKenzie, and David Butler for a question-and-answer session in which you put the questions. If you have a question, send it on a postcard please to: David Dimbleby, BBC, Wood Lane, London W12 8QT.” But how could you pose a question a week before the result?)

Then on Sunday at 08.55 it’s Election 97, which isn’t as interesting but will at least include Frank Skinner’s comedy bits, but we’ve worked out it probably won’t include Breakfast News from that day and henceforth the weather from 1997 and so on. Anyway, it all sounds smashing, and if you can catch it, make sure you do. And, of course, DTT viewers will only be able to listen to it, which is a fantastic image.

CBBC
Saturday, Sunday, 09.00
Dick and Dom in Da Bungalow – We completely forgot to mention this last week, which is ridiculous because the researcher on the show e-mailed us to tell us all about it; cos they’re screening old episodes of Rentaghost on it! So it might be worth a look, especially now SMTV’s gone a bit crap.

ELSEWHERE
Hard to top those listed above, but BBC4 pay tribute to Leo McKern on Thursday at 21.00 by repeating Country, a play from 1981 also starring James Fox. Bullseye’s on G+ at the same time as last week (Sunday, 22.30); Fry and Laurie certainly aren’t – this week Paramount are showing them on Sunday at 00.20 and Friday at 00.40.

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ANSWER YOUR MOBY COCK PIECE
No, we still haven’t had a better readers’ e-mail than that from Matthew Knowles, so if you’d like to get in touch with us, you can do so at Ask The Family, the TV Cream Message Board, located at http://tv.cream.org – click on Long Shots. Also there you can subscribe ton the TV Cream Update and count down the days to our exciting new look, coming soon! But unfortunately Creamguide will still be running as normal.
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Without anymore ado, over to Fred Dinenage and – Chris Hughes, Ian Jones, Graham Kibble-White