51
Daily Mail, Monday, August 19, 2019(^) TELEVISION
FILM CHOICES
The Work Wife, 2.15pm, Ch5
SEDUCTIVE deviousness in the workplace
puts pressure on a marriage already
reeling from recent tragedy in this TV
movie. Cerina Vincent is the new assistant
of Sean (Kevin Sizemore); she starts looking
to edge out Sean’s wife, Lisa (Elizabeth
Harnois), and claim her boss for herself.
Red Heat, 9pm, 5 Spike
ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER is
well-cast as the deadpan Moscow cop who
buddies up with a wisecracking Chicago
detective (James
Belushi). For
Ivan Danko
(Schwarzenegger,
pictured), the
hunt for a Soviet
druglord in
America is
personal — he’s the
man responsible
for killing Danko’s
partner back
home in Russia.
g g
Have a big gin, Ma’am, and forget
the royal train looks like a caravan
STUPID GAME OF THE WEEKEND:
Of all the daft pastimes, lobbing
rocks at parcels of gunpowder
is hard to beat. In Colombia
they call it tejo — a sort of
exploding boules. Romesh
Ranganathan tried it on his
Misadventures (BBC2). Luckily,
all he hit was the camera lens.T
he undisputed star
of the past few days
has been not a per-
son but a piano —
the gilded keyboard
upon which queen Victoria
and Prince Albert played
duets to while away the
evenings at Buck house.
Well, as one eminent musicologist
pointed out, they had to do some-
thing and there was no Netflix.
The piano appeared on BBC
Breakfast, which set newsreader
Naga Munchetty and weathergirl
Sarah Keith-Lucas swaying along
to Chopin, before it became the
centrepiece for a concert at the
royal Albert hall to mark the
monarch’s 200th birthday.
All gold filigree and fretted
curlicues, the piano was infinitely
more glamorous than the queen’s
private railway carriages, which
we glimpsed in Secrets Of The
Royal Train (C5).
Granted, during the whole hour,
we saw just a few colour snapshots
and a couple of very brief clips from
the news archives, shot on board
the regal loco.
But that was enough to confirm
that the style was less Palace of
Versailles, more VW Campervan.
The panelling appeared to be
plywood. The settees with their
faded monochrome fabrics looked
like her Majesty got them on
special offer as ex-display models.
The walls and trim were done inthat pale institutional green, as if
six pots had been left over when a
hospital was decorated.
honestly, the queen could travel
in more luxury if she hitched a
Sprite caravan to the back of
Philip’s Land rover.
But decor is not the royal couple’s
priority. They are more concerned
with other comforts, in particular
the standard of afternoon teas.
A platoon of chefs is on board, to
ensure the scones and jam are
perfect. Apparently the sovereign
likes to wash them down with her
tea-time bracer, a tumbler of
D&G... one part gin to two parts
Dubonnet. After one of those, who
cares what the couch looks like?
The anecdotes in this lightweight
documentary were a bit hit-and-
miss, but I did enjoy the one about
panic before breakfast, as they
steamed towards the Scottish
border, when an unnamed royal
announced that she (or he)
intended to dispense with the toast
and just have yoghurt.
Some of the footmen became
hysterical. There wasn’t a spoonful
of yoghurt on the entire train.Secrets Of The Royal Train HHHHI Comedy Shorts HHHII
CHRISTOPHER
STEVENS
WEEKEND TV
Mercifully, they were able to
make an unscheduled stop in
Carlisle, belt into a corner shop
and come out with an armful of
full-fat cherry flavour.
Who was that demanding
personage? We weren’t told, but
my money is on Princess Di —
and surely we can all agree it
wasn’t the Duke of edinburgh.
With the royals in Balmoraland the rest of us gearing up
for the August Bank holiday, the
Beeb schedulers were in the
mood to fill a few gaps with
anything that came to hand.
A half-hour hole was stuffed
with a pair of Comedy Shorts
(BBC2), which have been
available online via iPlayer for
nearly a month.
Lazy Susan was a series ofcharacter sketches starring
Freya Parker and Celeste Dring.
The best featured a pair of
brassy women in curlers, talking
over each other constantly and
occasionally amazed when they
both uttered the same vacuous
idea at once. The gag is timeless
— Les Dawson and roy
Barraclough, aka Cissie and Ada,
used to do it.
The other short, Gbemisola
Ikumelo’s Brain In Gear, would
have been stronger if it hadn’t
relied so heavily on toilet jokes
and dog poo gags.
For a real laugh from the same
series, go to iPlayer and find
Motherland’s Diane Morgan as
Mandy. Shown on TV last month,
it’s tears-down-your-face funny.CHANNEL 5
6.00 Milkshake! Peppa Pig (R) 6.15 Ben and
Holly’s Little Kingdom (R) 6.30 Olly the Little
White Van (R,HD) 6.35 Noddy: Toyland
Detective (R,HD) 6.45 Fireman Sam (R,HD)
6.55 Thomas & Friends: Big World! Big
Adventures! (R,HD) 7.05 Shane the Chef
(R,HD) 7.20 Peppa Pig (R,HD) 7.40 Top Wing
(R,HD) 7. 5 5 Paw Patrol (R,HD) 8.05 Digby
Dragon (R,HD) 8.20 Little Princess (R,HD)
8.40 Shimmer and Shine (R,HD)
8.55 Floogals (R,HD) 9.10 Sunny Bunnies (HD)
9.15 Jeremy Vine (HD)
11.15 GPs: Behind Closed Doors
(AD,R,HD) A special episode from
Horfield Health Centre in Bristol.
12.10 5 News Lunchtime (HD)
12.15 Celebs on the Farm (R,HD)
1.10 Access (HD)
1.15 Home and Away (AD,HD)
1.45 Neighbours (AD,HD)
2.15 The Work Wife (2018) (15) ● (HD)
Drama, with Cerina Vincent, Kevin
Sizemore. See Critics’ Choice.
4.00 Friends (R,HD)
4.30 Friends (R,HD)
5.00 5 News (HD)
5.30 Neighbours (AD,R,HD)
Yashvi makes matters worse
between herself and Shane.
6.00 Home and Away (AD,R,HD) Robbo
and Jasmine tie the knot. Lance is
worried about a mystery call.
6.30 5 News Tonight (HD)7.00 Building Britain’s Railways with
Chris Tarrant (R,HD) How trains
transformed the nation and
shaped modern Britain, beginning
by looking at the invention of
the steam locomotive.
(Followed by 5 News Update)8.00 Big Week at the Zoo (HD)
New series. Helen Skelton and
Nick Baker return to Yorkshire
Wildlife Park, near Doncaster.
See Critics’ Choice.
(Followed by 5 News Update)9.00 The Secret World of Your
Rubbish (HD) The work of Refood,
which diverts rotting food from
landfill and plugs it into the
National Grid, and a couple
whose mission is to recycle
the unrecyclable. Last in series.10.00 Manhunt: Killer on the Run
(R,HD) The team tracks a
convicted murderer suspected
of committing assault while
out on licence from prison
and mounts a surveillance
operation on a burglary suspect.11.05 Secrets of the World’s Toughest
Prison (R,HD) Paul Connolly
experiences life as an inmate in
some of the world’s most
notorious prisons, serving time
with some of Poland’s most
dangerous criminals.12.05 Panic at 30,000 Feet (R,HD) 1.00
The 21.co.uk Live Casino Show (HD)
3.00 Access (HD) 3.10 Gotham: Rise
of the Villains (AD,R,HD) 4.00 Ben
Fogle: New Lives in the Wild (BSL,R)
4.45 House Doctor (BSL,R)
5.10 House Doctor (BSL,R)
5.35 Wildlife SOS (BSL,R)(^) ▲ Particularly liable to offend
WELSH TV VARIATIONS
BBC1: 1.30pm BBC Wales Today; Weather. 6.30 BBC
Wales Today; Weather. 10.25 BBC Wales Today.
S4C: 6.00am Cyw. 12noon Newyddion S4C a’r
Tywydd. 12.05 Ward Plant. 12.30 Heno. 1.30 Taith
Fawr y Dyn Bach. 2.00 Newyddion S4C a’r Tywydd.
2.05 Prynhawn Da. 3.00 Newyddion S4C a’r Tywydd.
3.05 Trysorau’r Teulu. 4.00 Awr Fawr: Bing. 4.10 Awr
Fawr: Rapsgaliwn. 4.25 Awr Fawr: Cymylaubychain.
4.35 Awr Fawr: Guto Gwningen. 4.50 Awr Fawr: Oli
Wyn. 5.00 Stwnsh. 6.00 Newyddion S4C a’r Tywydd.
6.05 Y Wal. 7.00 Heno. 8.00 Pobol y Cwm. 8.25 Adre.
8.55 Chwedloni: Cwpan Rybgi’r Byd. 9.00
Newyddion 9 a’r Tywydd. 9.30 Drych. Innovators at
Bangor University attempt to build a synthetic
voice. 10.30 Codi Pac. Geraint Hardy visits Merthyr
Tydfil. 11.00 Traed Lan. A woman explains why she
wants to become an undertaker. 11.30 Bad Achub
Porthdinllaen. A journalist from a national
magazine arrives to interview the female crew
members, and an RNLI inspector checks how Mike
and the team are getting on with the new boat.
PICK
FILM
CHOICE